Smoke and Mirrors
by JamiW
Summary: The 13th story in the Free series, set after Slow Burn.  Case files and romance, and a little suspense from time to time.  BA, MC, RR, LR, and more.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: If you don't remember where Slow Burn left off, you may want to go back and read at least the last portion of the last chapter. This picks up a few hours later.**

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><p><strong>Bobby POV<strong>

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><p>"Tell me what happened."<p>

"Get him out of here first," the kid responded petulantly. I glanced over my shoulder to where Ross was standing near the door.

He didn't want to leave, I could tell.

But I also knew that he trusted me with his son.

He stared at me for a solid minute and then he looked over at Jeremy briefly before walking out of the room.

"Okay, Jeremy," I said once the door was closed. "It's just you and me. Now tell me what happened."

I sat back in my chair and held the boy's gaze.

"So how come the chief trusts you with his most prized possession?" he asked me cynically.

"Prized possession. That would be you?"

"What do you think?"

"I don't think he considers you a possession. You're his son. He loves you."

"What do you know about it? You're the cop who was banging my mother."

That was about the last thing I'd been expecting him to say and it took me longer than I'd like to admit to mentally recover.

"Jeremy, I barely know your mother…"

"Like you gotta know a woman to fuck her," he interrupted.

"That's how you talk about your mother?" I fired back as I got up from my chair. I leaned over the table, putting my hands flat on the surface. "I think you need to show her some respect."

"She ain't here," he said with a shrug.

"That's a good thing. She's already dealing with the fact that her son was arrested for murder. I'd hate for her to have to stand by and watch while you act like a spoiled, ungrateful brat."

"Brat? Is that the best you can do, Detective?"

"You know what? I just drove four hours after being up all night so that I could try to help you out of a jam, but I'm starting to think it was a waste of my time."

"It was. See ya."

"So that's it? You just want to stay in here and take your chances with the Baltimore PD? You know that Maryland has the death penalty, right?"

He paled slightly when I mentioned the death penalty.

His bravado was all an act. Maybe not the resentment of his father, or possibly even of me since he had obviously heard the rumor about me and his mother, but he was definitely scared.

I walked around the table and sat down on the edge, so that I was seated right next to his chair.

"My personal life is none of your business. But just so that we can clear the air, I'm going to tell you something. I'm not the cop who had the affair with your mother. I know your father believed that for awhile, but he knows the truth now. And however you feel about your dad is irrelevant to the situation you're in right now. You realize that, right? You're in a world of shit at the moment. My partner and I are here to help you, but you have to be willing to help yourself. And I'm not going to tolerate any more disrespect from you, are we clear?"

He thought about my words for a minute, maybe two, and then he finally gave me a nod.

"So where's your partner?"

"She's talking to the officers who arrested you so that we can get the whole story. She's getting their side. I'm going to get yours. So what do you say?"

"She? Are you still partnered with that hot chick?"

"Remember what I said about respect?"

"Yeah. Sorry. But it's Eames, right?"

"It's Goren. My hot chick partner is my wife," I told him. "Now can we get down to business because the clock is ticking and BPD is itching to throw the book at you."

He stared at me for a moment longer and then slouched over the table, stretching out one arm and then laying his head on it.

"I know," he said as he closed his eyes and took in a deep breath. "And I know I'm being a tool. Look, I've got the hangover from hell, okay? I've been sitting in this room for more than seven hours and then Dad had to come in and read me the riot act."

"What did you expect him to do?"

"Not that," he said like it was obvious. "He's always gotta act so high and mighty, like everyone makes mistakes except him."

"Jeremy, let's talk about you, okay? Tell me about last night. You got drunk?"

"Yeah. Me and some buddies hit up a frat party."

"On K Street?"

That was the scene of the crime.

That was where Jeremy had been found with the victim.

"Right. It wasn't happening, but my girl wanted to stay, so…"

"Your girl. That's Kelly?"

He sat up in his chair again and his eyes filled with tears. This kid was all over the map.

"Uh huh. We've been hooking up for a couple of months now."

"Hooking up," I stated. "You mean having sex?"

I'd seen the police report.

The victim, Kelly Farrar, had been raped and then stabbed to death with a screw driver.

"Yeah," he said, once again looking at me like I was stupid. "I'm nineteen. I have sex with my girlfriend."

"That's fine. I just wanted to make sure we were on the same page," I said soothingly. "So walk me through last night. You went to the party. Did Kelly go with you, or did she meet you there?"

"She came later, with a couple of her friends. It was maybe ten-thirty when she showed up."

"And you got there at...what time?"

"Eight thirty. Or eight forty-five. Something like that."

"Were the two of you fighting?"

"No," he said quickly. "Nothing like that. She was high when she showed up and so she was really…you know…amorous."

"And you were…amorous, too? Or were you upset that she'd been smoking weed without you?"

"I don't do that stuff, man."

"Come on, Jeremy. You know the cops are processing your drug test as we speak. You honestly expect me to believe that it's going to come back negative?"

"I dropped some E," he admitted quietly.

"That's it?"

He paused for a minute and then looked down at the table.

"Are you gonna rat me out?'

"You need to get over that," I told him. "All of your secrets are going to come to light now."

"We were kitty-flippin', okay?" he said reluctantly.

"Okay," I said evenly, although on the inside, I was hurting for Ross.

This had to be killing him.

And the fact that Jeremy was high on a mixture of ketamine and ecstasy wasn't going to help his case.

"And you were drinking. Beer? Liquor?" I asked.

"Both. There was a keg, but someone was passing around a bottle of Wild Turkey, too."

"So Kelly showed up feeling amorous and…"

"We worked the room for an hour or two and then we went upstairs."

"To have sex."

"That was the plan, yeah."

"The plan. So you didn't? What happened? Did she change her mind?"

"No," he said, but then he furrowed his brow and looked up at me. "I mean, I don't think so. She said something about Kenny and I…"

"You what? Who's Kenny?"

"This guy on her hall…he's been working it, but you know, I'm not trying to be all jealous or nothing because she's not into him."

"She's into you," I clarified.

"Right," he said. He looked like he wanted to say more, but then he shook his head and went back to studying the table.

"What did she say about Kenny?"

"She said he was creepin' on her," he said slowly, as though he was just remembering the conversation. "And I…I think I asked her why she kept him danglin', you know? I think…"

"You were mad."

"Yeah."

"Was this before or after you had sex?"

"I don't know. I think we started, but then…I'm not sure."

"So you don't remember any more about what happened after you went up into the bedroom?"

"I know I woke up when the cops dragged me off of the bed, down onto the floor and shoved my face into the carpet. They put the cuffs on me and I…I didn't even know what was going on. They pulled me to my feet and that was when I saw her…"

He paused when someone knocked on the door and after a second, Alex opened the door and came inside.

"How're you doing, Jeremy?" she asked.

"I've been better," he replied, and I was glad to see that his belligerence was gone, at least for the moment.

"What've you got?" I asked her, nodding my head toward the file folder in her hand.

She gestured for me to join her at the door, so I got up from the table and crossed the room, putting my back to Jeremy.

"The semen in the victim is a preliminary match to Jeremy," she whispered.

"It was his girlfriend. They may have had consensual sex."

She shook her head and then handed me the file so that I could open it.

On top was the initial coroner's report.

I glanced over it quickly, taking in words like _tearing_ and _excessive bruising_ and _abrasions_.

"This is more than rough sex," she said, pre-empting my suggestion of the possibility that maybe they'd just gotten a little carried away. "And the tox report shows that the victim tested positive for cannabis and ketamine."

"He admitted to doing drugs, too. And he told me that she was high when she got to the party."

"There's more," she said, reaching over to flip the pages. On the next page, she ran her finger down to the middle of the report. "Here."

My heart sank as I read the words.

Jeremy's prints were on the murder weapon.

I closed the file and caught Alex's eye, each of us with our backs still to Jeremy.

"This is bad," she said softly. "What's his story?"

"He doesn't remember."

"We need to make him remember," she replied, and then we turned around to face him again.

"What's it say?" he asked in concern.

"The evidence doesn't look good," I answered vaguely. "We really need you to think hard about what happened."

"I told you," he said as he got up from his chair. "I told you everything I remember."

"Was it just the two of you in the bedroom?"

"Yeah. Yeah, I think so."

"Did you lock the door?"

Because the door was locked when the police showed up.

One of the roommates had called 9-1-1 because he couldn't get in and he couldn't get either Jeremy or Kelly to answer, even after pounding on the door for nearly half an hour.

"I don't know."

"You went in there for privacy," I reminded him. "Wouldn't you have locked the door?"

He shrugged and said, "It wasn't a priority. Sometimes people walk in. It happens."

"Did you know the guy whose room you were using?"

"No, not really."

"Had you been in that room before?"

"No."

"He had a toolbox under his desk," Alex told him. "Do you remember seeing that?"

"A toolbox? I don't know. Yeah, maybe. Was it red?"

"So you did see it," I stated. "Why? Why would you notice a toolbox when you weren't sure if you even locked the door?"

"I…don't know."

"You were mad at Kelly, right? For leading Kenny on?"

"No. Not really."

"A few minutes ago, you said you were mad," I reminded him.

"Look, he was a loser, okay? She was never gonna get with him."

"But she wouldn't tell him that. She kept letting him think he had a chance."

"Well, yeah. I mean, how hard was it to just say _no_, you know?"

"You had a fight about it," Alex said, having caught up to the scenario.

"Maybe," he said. Then he nodded and said, "Yeah. She even put her shirt back on because she was mad that I was mad. How fucked up is that?"

"So you were making out, you started arguing about Kenny, she got pissed and got dressed again, and then…"

He stared at the floor for a long time and then he looked up, first at Alex and then at me.

"I don't know."

"Sit down, Jeremy," I said, walking over to the table. I pulled out a chair and sat down across from him. He kept his eyes on me as he slowly eased into the chair.

"What is it?"

"Your prints are on the murder weapon."

"Mine? No. No way. I couldn't…I would never…"

"And you definitely had sex with her," I added. "So your story's not adding up."

Now his face flooded with fear and he broke my gaze so that he could look at Alex.

"I didn't do it," he said adamantly. "I didn't."

"Okay. But we need you to remember," she told him. "We need to know everything about her life, your life, the party…everything, so that we can find out who did this."

"My prints are really on the screw driver?" he asked, and that was when I really started to feel sick.

"Screw driver?" I asked him.

To my knowledge, no one had told him what Kelly had been stabbed with. The tool had been found under the bed after Jeremy had been taken away.

"How did you know the murder weapon was a screw driver?"

TBC...


	2. Chapter 2

**Bernard POV**

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><p>I rolled over in the bed, stretching out across the empty expanse of mattress.<p>

I was fairly used to being alone in the bed.

Much too used to it, in fact.

And I wasn't sure if it was because I was getting older, or because the friends that I had now were all attached…or maybe it was because I'd met Lauren.

But whatever the case, I was actually tired of sleeping alone.

I was tired of _being_ alone.

Although this morning, things were different.

Partly because I was still riding on a high from last night.

_"Come upstairs,"_ she'd said as she kissed my neck in a way that had me restless and wanting more.

Lauren had that effect on me.

It was inexplicable, the power she held over me.

And in the beginning, maybe it had mostly been about her looks. I mean, I'm not going to lie. The woman is drop-dead gorgeous. She belongs on a fashion runway instead of in a police precinct.

But then I got to know her and her looks became completely secondary.

And she absolutely belongs in a squad room.

She's an excellent cop, with natural instincts and strong intuition.

And she's really funny and smart and I had no idea why she'd become fixated on me because I'm not even close to being in her league.

Normally, I do fine with the ladies. But I'm also realistic. I don't push my luck and go for ones who're unattainable.

If I'd seen Lauren in a bar, I would've written her off as impossible. There was literally no way in hell that she'd ever give me a second glance.

But there we were, last night in the car. She was holding onto a handful of my shirt and she was asking me, in that raspy voice of hers, to go up to her apartment.

"_Just for a little while. I want to kiss you without this console in between us."_

I was half-afraid that if I got her alone behind closed doors, I wouldn't be able to stop at just kissing.

Because I really wanted her.

_Really_.

So I made a last ditch effort.

_"We were going to wait, remember? Until after the case."_

_"You were going to wait. I've decided not to. So...do you want to fight about it? Or do you want to go upstairs?"_

Now how in the hell was I supposed to refuse an offer like that?

I couldn't.

I didn't.

I pulled the keys from the ignition and followed her up to her apartment.

I was nervous, too, although I'm not sure why.

Or maybe it wasn't nerves.

Maybe it was just desire combined with emotion that was making my hands shake.

While she unlocked the door, I chastised myself for acting like a forty-year-old virgin, and then I did my best to try to relax.

"You look really nice tonight," I told her. She paused with her hand on the doorknob and looked back at me with a dubious smile.

"It's almost three o'clock in the morning, and I've been drinking tequila half the night. Somehow I doubt that I look all that hot."

"Oh, you look hot," I confirmed, matching her smile. "I don't think it's possible for you to look anything else."

"You should see me when I first wake up in the morning," she said as she opened the door and led the way inside.

"I have, remember?"

"I remember," she agreed quietly. "Although I'm not sure that counts."

"No?"

"Huh uh," she said, stepping closer to me and once again grabbing onto the front of my shirt. "There were no night-before sweaty activities going on. That's the real test, you know."

"The real test," I repeated, because her proximity was causing my brain to malfunction.

She was pressed up against me and her mouth was close to mine and I couldn't seem to focus on anything else.

"Looking good after a night of making love," she clarified as she brought her lips to mine.

I couldn't imagine her looking anything but beautiful after something like that, but I wasn't going to stop kissing her to argue that point.

In fact, I think the building could've burned down around us and I wouldn't stop kissing her.

Janis was meowing and circling around our feet, but neither of us paid any attention.

It was the first time we'd kissed anywhere other than in the car and it changed the whole dynamic.

She was aggressive, in a good way. She stepped into me, walking me backwards until I hit the wall at the edge of the living room. With the resistance against my back, she leaned into me even more and I was able to feel her whole body against mine.

I had one hand on the back of her head and I moved the other around to the small of her back. I could feel the edge of her shirt, where it had pulled up slightly from the waistband of her pants, and I couldn't resist sliding my hand beneath it.

I was quickly losing control.

"This is so much better," she murmured as she broke off the kiss and pulled back to look at me.

"Better than…"

"Than doing this with the console between us," she said with an amused smile. It was no secret that I was running light on brain function. "I'm glad you came up."

"Me, too," I agreed. "But you know, it's late, and I…probably better go."

"You don't have to," she offered. "You can stay if you want."

"You're a smart woman," I told her. "You know I want to stay. But I also think that maybe we'd better take this slow and honestly, if I don't leave in the next minute, I might not be able to stop myself from having you right here on this floor."

She smiled fully and moved her hands down to my belt loops, taking hold of them and pulling my hips against hers.

"This floor hasn't seen any action since…well, _ever_," she countered in a voice that was crushing my resolve. "And I think slow is overrated."

"And _I_ think…that you had a lot to drink," I forced myself to say. "And maybe it would be better if we wait."

"We can wait," she agreed reluctantly, releasing her hold on me and taking a step back. "But it's not going to get any better."

I had to be out of my mind to walk away from her.

But it was the right thing to do, right?

_Right_?

I kissed her again, just for a little additional torture, and then I headed for the door.

"Thanks for the ride, B.," she said.

Her remark was innocent, but it immediately reminded me of Logan's comment earlier tonight.

_So Bernard…are you going to…give her a ride?_

No, apparently I wasn't because I was too much of an idiot.

"I'll call you tomorrow, okay?" I promised as I opened the door.

She nodded and then kissed me again, and as she delivered the slow, tantalizing, extremely arousing show of affection, she also grabbed onto the front of my belt.

She seemed to like keeping a handle on me, as though she was afraid I might run.

Which, I guess I could understand, since it seemed I was always walking away from her.

And why was that exactly?

I had this unbelievably perfect woman who wanted me, seemingly as much as I wanted her.

So why was it again that I was halfway out the door?

Was I _really_ just trying to be gentlemanly or was I letting my experience with Janelle mess with my mind?

Did I honestly think that Lauren was anything like that con-artist?

She broke off the kiss and let go of my belt, but I continued to stand in the doorway.

"Tell me again how much you had to drink," I said.

She smiled broadly and answered, "Not that much. I only said that I _drank_ tequila, not that I drank _a lot_. I'm not drunk. Not even close. And it definitely hasn't effected my judgment."

And just like that, I made up my mind.

I went back inside and pulled her into my arms, kissing her with single-minded purpose as I used my foot to slam the door closed behind me.

That was last night.

And now it was morning, and I was stretched out comfortably in Lauren's bed.

Janis had awakened us a few minutes earlier with her incessant meowing.

"She must be out of food," Lauren mumbled. She had her back to me and I had my arms around her, holding her closely against me.

"How long is she going to be making that noise?"

"As long as it takes for me to get up and refill her bowl," she answered. Then she turned in my arms and kissed me hard. "I'll take care of her and then I'll be right back."

"Promise?"

"Two minutes. Tops."

She pulled away from me and got up from the bed.

"Even first thing in the morning," I said as I watched her walk across the room. "After a night of making love. You're still beautiful."

"Well, I'm naked," she deflected. "Surely that's distracted you."

"You _are_ distracting," I agreed with a grin. "I'll give you that."

"What else are you gonna give me?" she asked coyly, pausing in the doorway.

"Hurry back and you'll find out."

I rolled over to check the clock and then I stretched back out in the bed.

I _was_ tired of being alone.

But at the moment, not only was I riding on last night's high, but this morning's as well.

Waking up with Lauren in my arms…that was something I could get used to.

_Unless this didn't mean anything to her_, the cynical side of my mind provided.

What if this was her M.O.?

I mean, I really didn't know that much about her past.

_But she's a cop,_ I argued internally.

And I was a friend of her partner.

Surely there were plenty of less complicated men she could've chosen if it was only about sex.

And then that thought almost caused me to laugh out loud.

Only about sex?

_Look at her and then look at you, B_., I thought.

It _has_ to be about more than sex.

True to her word, Lauren was back quickly, and one look at her made all of my negative thoughts disappear.

And I don't mean because of the way she looked.

I mean because of the way she was looking at _me_.

"Now you see why I don't like cats, right? She ruined a perfectly good sleep," I complained teasingly as she walked towards the bed.

"Yeah, but see," she began as she grabbed onto the covers and pulled them towards the foot of the bed. She kept dragging the sheets and blankets down until they were in a pile at my feet and then her eyes tracked slowly over me. "Now, we're awake. And I don't know about you, but I'm thinking that being in bed awake is so much more fun than being in bed asleep."

She climbed onto the bed, sitting on her knees with one leg on either side of me. I immediately set my hands on her thighs while she trailed her fingers over my chest in a slow, enticing rhythm.

"I'm glad you didn't go home last night," she continued. She leaned over me, hovering close, like she was studying me.

I just watched her eyes.

I don't think I've ever seen anyone with eyes the color of hers. They were just _so_ blue. I'd even asked her once, a few days ago, if she wore contacts because I thought maybe the color was enhanced, but she'd said no.

"I think it would've crushed my self-confidence if you'd left," she continued as she pressed her lips against my cheek.

"There's no way you have confidence issues."

"You'd be surprised. And I think I was pretty clear about what I wanted, so if you'd left…"

"I was trying to be a nice guy."

"You _are_ a nice guy," she answered, still kissing lightly along my face.

"And I may have brought a little baggage along with me," I admitted.

She pulled back and looked at me and said, "I wondered about that. Don't worry. I have my fair share of it, too. We'll work it out."

And then she finally brought her lips to mine, kissing me in a way that had me grabbing onto her hips, shifting her so that she was right where I wanted her.

She sighed contentedly and sat back, taking me in fully and then starting a slow rhythm.

"Alex and Carolyn were right about men in their forties," she said with a mischievous smile.

"I'm pretty sure I don't want to hear anything those two were saying if it relates to sex."

She chuckled and added, "Well, it wasn't just them. Mary, Connie…"

"Are we going to talk why we do this?" I asked in amusement, although I had to admit that I liked it.

It was a different experience for me. Most of the women I knew were all business in bed.

And normally, men didn't take it well when a woman laughed while making love.

Some might consider it a disparaging performance indicator.

But I loved her light-heartedness and her upbeat outlook.

"Do you have trouble multi-tasking?" she teased.

"I have trouble putting two words together when you just look at me, so you can imagine how hard it is to manage a sentence when you're doing _that_."

"I'd say you're doing just fine."

"So...men in their forties," I said, getting into the spirit of having a conversation.

It was a challenge to maintain focus and it was also now my mission to see what it would take to cause her conversational abilities to falter.

"It's the new nineteen."

I raised an eyebrow at her and she added, "For a man's sexual prime."

"Oh, so I'm in it," I said with a grin. "Good to know. And this is a first for you?"

"Well, I look young, so it always seems to work out that I end up with younger men."

"Uh huh," I mused vaguely as I rolled us over so that now she was beneath me. I paused for a moment, just to look at her, and then I went about living up to the reputation of being in my prime.

"What a mistake that's been," she continued. "I…and…um…"

I felt ridiculously pleased with myself as she gave up all pretense of creating a sentence, and instead threw her head back and closed her eyes.

Afterwards, I pulled the blankets over us and held her in my arms as we drifted back to sleep. Neither of us moved until my cell phone buzzed, rattling around on the bedside table.

"What time is it?" she mumbled.

"I don't know," I replied, blindly reaching over to the nightstand to pick up my phone.

I didn't plan to answer it, unless it was Ross or Lupo, although it had quit buzzing so it was more likely a text.

"It's ten-thirty," I said as I clicked on the text icon. "It's a message from Lupo."

_**Call me as soon as you can.**_

"What's that about?" Lauren asked after I read the message out loud.

We both sat up in the bed, the prospect of sleep now forgotten.

"I don't know, but it's not like him to be cryptic."

"Call him," she encouraged. She sounded like her radar was up, too, and that made me nervous.

So I called my partner and he answered on the first ring.

"Connie got an email," he said. "It may be tied into your ADA case."

"Read it to me."

"Two dead ADA's. It's a shame one wasn't you. Maybe the third time's a charm. Don't forget – I know where you live."

"When did it come in?" I asked as I got up from the bed. Lauren followed my lead and began to get dressed.

"When we got home from the poker game."

"And you're just now calling me?"

"I checked the apartment," he said firmly. And then he dropped his voice to a hushed tone. "And I slept with my nine under the mattress. There wasn't anything you could've done last night."

"Okay," I said, lightening my tone. He didn't need me on his ass. I had no doubt that the email had him on edge. "I'll get Hayes and we'll be over there in half an hour."

I hung up with him and turned to where Lauren was looking at me questioningly.

"What happened?"

"Connie's stalker sent her an email and he mentioned our Staten Island ADA's."

"You think he's our killer?"

"No. I don't know. But it's the second time he's stated that he knows where she lives, and I know I don't like that."

TBC...


	3. Chapter 3

**Carolyn POV**

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><p>I felt a little bad for not being completely honest with Mike.<p>

Okay, I felt a _lot_ bad.

Lying to him didn't come natural to me and after we went up to bed, I couldn't sleep.

Nearly a dozen times, I started to confess.

I _wanted_ to confess.

But I also wanted to protect him, so I kept my mouth shut.

"_I just want to talk,"_ Jack had said when he called me yesterday.

"_There's nothing to talk about."_

"_You know that's not true."_

"_I'm not meeting you anywhere. I took out a restraining order on you today,"_ I told him. _"So I don't know why you'd even want to come to New York."_

"_I hear it's beautiful in April."_

"_So is D.C.,"_ I retorted.

"_So are you,"_ he said quietly.

"_Forget it, Jack."_

"_How am I supposed to forget you?"_

"_Because it's been twenty years,"_ I reminded him cuttingly_. "And because I'm happily married. And even if I wasn't, we've been over for a long time. And you…you should be in jail right now."_

"_Because of you."_

I sighed heavily and looked anxiously at Liz's door. Mike had brought me over here for our girls' night, and then he and Ross had left shortly thereafter. I'd stepped outside to take the call, but I hadn't mentioned who was on the phone. No one else had shown yet, and Liz wasn't overly nosy, so as long as I wasn't gone long, I didn't think she'd ask about it.

But I still needed to hurry up.

"_What do you want?" _I asked him in irritation.

"_I'm just wondering what your husband would think if he knew about us."_

"_I told him. I don't keep secrets from Mike."_

"_Really?" _he asked in amusement. _"And he was okay with it?"_

"_It was a long time ago."_

"_I'm talking about what happened a few months ago when you met me down in Asheville."_

"_I consulted on a case."_

"_Consulted. Is that what they're calling it these days?"_

"_Nothing happened between us,"_ I said sharply.

"_That's not how I remember it."_

"_Well, you remember it wrong."_

"_I've got the photographic evidence to back it up, darlin'."_

"_What's your game? Why are you doing this?"_ I snapped back.

"_You ruined my life. Now it's my turn," _he said menacingly. _"Meet me at the Court Square Diner on 23__rd__ at noon tomorrow."_

"_I don't know if I can get away."_

"_You're a smart woman. Figure it out. And this stays just between us."_

He'd hung up at that point and I'd stayed outside an extra minute just so that I could gather my composure.

What was he up to?

I wasn't sure, but I had to go find out.

The Chesley Watkins case had been hard on Mike.

I wouldn't have even mentioned Jack to him at all if it hadn't been for that letter.

But it would be better if he just thought that Jack was still hiding in the woodwork for now. Mike needed to get his feet back underneath him.

I toyed with the idea of telling Alex, maybe asking her to tag along and watch from the sidelines, but she'd been through the wringer lately, too. First Cathy and then Kevin…not to mention the fact that she was dealing with a dislocated shoulder.

Connie was getting death threats.

Liz was only recently starting to recover from the attack.

And Hayes was too new. It wasn't that I didn't like her, because I did. But I wasn't ready to put that kind of trust into her just yet.

Mary, maybe. But she was flying home to pack up for the move.

I finally decided that I'd meet Jack at the diner, and then if I needed help after that, I'd enlist Mary. She'd be coming back on Sunday night, so I could bring her up to speed if help was required.

Although I couldn't imagine for what.

Jack had some pictures he wanted to show me…was he honestly going to threaten to tell Mike that we'd had an affair? And for the purpose of what?

I didn't even want to think about that. Instead, I'd gone inside and started harassing Liz to tell details about her trip to the Catskills.

That was last night.

This morning, I'd lied to Mike.

"I'm going to meet a client for lunch," I told him.

"What kind of client?"

"It was that probate investigation I did last month. Remember? For the Grants? He said he had a follow-up quickie job for me. I guess he's having trouble locating one of the named recipients."

"You don't want to hand that off to Johnny? I mean, we do kind of have another job."

"I would, but it shouldn't take much time and I developed a rapport with the guy. He has the potential to bring a lot of work into the business, so I thought it would be best if I close out the case myself."

And all of that was true.

Except that I wasn't meeting him today at lunch.

I'd actually done a phone consult with him yesterday, so I already knew what it was that he needed.

"So you're going to meet another guy for lunch, huh?" he asked as he came up behind me and wrapped his arms around me. "Should I be jealous?"

"No," I said, but even I could recognize that I said it too quickly. To cover, I turned in his arms and kissed him firmly. "You don't ever need to be jealous."

"And yet I can't seem to help myself," he said with a smile.

He was in a good mood today, which served to increase my feeling of guilt, but it also increased my resolve to protect him.

He _deserved_ to be happy.

He didn't need whatever mess Jack was going to try to bring into our lives.

Mike tightened his hold on me and then kissed me again, this time backing me up against the bathroom doorway.

"So you're going to leave me here all alone on a Saturday?" he asked in a husky voice as he moved his mouth from my lips around to my ear. "Because you know, there's a pretty good chance that I'll manage to find some kind of trouble."

"I won't be gone long," I promised. I leaned my head back against the door frame as he continued to tease the area around my ear with his tongue and his teeth.

"I could come with you," he offered. "And then afterwards, we can take a drive…enjoy the day…"

"I think that's a great idea," I agreed. "But you haven't even showered yet, and I need to go or I'm going to be late. I'll come back here after the meeting and pick you up, okay? And then maybe we can drive out to Long Beach."

I allowed myself another few minutes to enjoy his attention, and then I said my goodbyes and left the house.

I didn't like this feeling.

Not at all.

But I wanted to find out what Jack had up his sleeve.

That case last fall had been difficult on Mike. He was a passionate guy and it drove him crazy thinking about my history with other men. It wasn't that he couldn't understand it. He certainly didn't expect for me to be unspoiled by the time he and I got together.

It was just that he didn't want to _think_ about it. So I didn't want him to have to think about it either.

I drove over to 23rd and found a place to park. It was ten minutes before twelve, but I made a habit out of being early.

Jack was already sitting at a table when I got inside.

"Ten minutes early is five minutes late," he quipped to me as I sat down.

"I'm not in the Marine Corps anymore, Jack. Neither are you. Now what's this all about?"

"You're not even going to ask how I've been? Come on, Carolyn. We go too far back for resentment."

"You blackmailed me into coming here using fabricated evidence. How did you expect me to act?"

"I remember how you used to act. Like you couldn't get enough of me."

I bit back my smartass reply since the waitress approached the table.

Jack ordered a sandwich and salad, but I just asked for coffee.

"You're not going to eat?"

"I lost my appetite."

"I'm so disappointed," he said thoughtfully. "You're not even a little bit happy to see me? I triumphed over all of that crap you got me into in Cherokee. I walked away a free man."

"That just goes to show you that the justice system is in need of improvement," I retorted. "And for the record, you got yourself into that crap in Cherokee. Money laundering…murder…you're not even close to the man I used to know."

"The man you used to love," he corrected.

"It was never about love with us."

"It was just sex? Is that what you're going to tell me?"

"It's a fact."

"So tell me about Mike," he said conversationally, sitting back in the chair. "If I remember correctly, he's a bit of a bulldog. What could you possibly have in common with someone so lacking in intelligence?"

"Do you have something of value to talk about? Because if not, I have plans."

"I was just wondering if he told you about his mother."

"He's my husband," I said guardedly. "Of course he's talked about his mother."

"So you know the whole, sordid story?"

I glared at him as I tried to decide where he was going with this line of dialogue.

He'd checked Mike out?

"I know everything about him," I replied.

"Huh. And you married him anyway," he said, shaking his head. "Maybe you're not so high and mighty after all."

"Two more minutes, and I'm walking out the door, so if you want something from me, then get to it."

"Oh, I want something from you alright," he said. "But I'm not ready to lay it all out just yet. I want you to be a little more willing to say yes."

As he spoke, he reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a small envelope.

He set it on the table in between us, but I didn't pick it up.

"Aren't you going to look?" he asked with a grin.

"You want me to believe that you have photos of the two of us in some kind of compromising position. I'm not taking the bait."

"Okay," he said, reaching for the envelope. "Maybe I'll just mail them to Mike."

In aggravation, I grabbed the envelope, pulling it from his hand.

I slowly opened it and looked inside.

I couldn't stop the gasp that escaped when I laid my eyes on those pictures.

"I know," he said, as though the sound was an admiring one. "Beautiful, aren't they? Look at you…you were so incredible back then. Not that you aren't now," he added quickly. "There's nothing wrong with a little age on a woman."

"Where did you get these?" I finally managed to ask.

"I've been admiring these for years. My wife had hired a private investigator when she suspected me of having an affair. I don't know why she never showed them to me at the time, but I found them after she died. Kind of ironic, isn't it? I mean, that she hired a P.I. to catch us in the act, considering that's what you do now."

"I'm with the NYPD," I corrected, although I couldn't tear my eyes away from the pictures.

They'd been taken twenty years ago, but seeing them had taken my mind back to that exact place in time.

What would seeing these photos do to Mike?

I mean, I knew he wouldn't be mad at me, but I didn't want these images in his mind. He'd torture himself to death just thinking about it.

"I bet Mike would love to get a look at these," Jack said, as though he was reading my mind. "And it wouldn't take much work with a computer to make a couple of these look a little more…current. And a guy like him, with all those mommy issues…trust must be difficult for him."

"Shut up," I said fiercely, as I grabbed up the photos from the table. I didn't want him looking at them, and I didn't want him talking about Mike…I just needed to get the hell away from him.

"A touchy subject, huh?"

"What do you want to do, Jack? Blackmail me? For what?"

"Oh, I'll get to that. I just wanted to start by reminding you of what you could've had."

I was holding the stack of photos tightly against my chest as though I could make them disappear through sheer force of will, and as he spoke, he reached across and touched my arm, stroking it lightly before plucking one of the pictures from my grasp.

He turned it over and looked at it carefully before holding it up to show me.

"This one is a personal favorite," he commented.

I quickly jerked it from his hand and then took all of them and jammed them into my purse.

"There's nothing to be ashamed of," he added. "You look beautiful. We were beautiful together. And you know…it's not too late."

"Have you completely lost your mind?" I asked him in disbelief. It was all I could do not to shout, but the diner was crowded and I didn't need to call any undue attention to us.

"I'm offering you an out," he said simply. "From a distasteful marriage."

"So far all you've managed to do is make me despise you even more than I already did."

"Hate is a wasted emotion, Carolyn. It makes you susceptible to failure. You know better than that. Have you forgotten everything you learned?"

"I'm the one who beat you, remember? That's why you're on probation. That's why there's a restraining order out against you. I could arrest you right now just on principle."

"But you won't. Because I'm betting you didn't tell Mike about our meeting, did you? And you know damn well those aren't the only copies of those pictures. I keep a set next to my bed, and I…"

"I'm done," I interrupted, getting up from the table "Do what you want, but I'm not playing your games."

I headed for the exit, but he called out after me.

"Wait," he said as he stood up and followed me to the door. "I'll be in touch. I wanted to give you something to think about for a couple of days and then I'll let you know what I need."

"I don't care what you need," I said stiffly.

But I did care. I didn't want him mailing this pornographic crap to Mike.

"Yes, you do. And you care about letting Mike keep his little secret, too."

His statement caused me to falter as I went to push open the door.

What the hell did he mean by that?

Was it the abuse? Because that wasn't exactly a secret. I mean, he didn't advertise it, but a lot of people knew.

So did that mean it was something else?

"I'll call you Monday, darlin'," he said, leaning in close and causing me to take a step backwards. I hated that he had me backpedaling, both literally and figuratively. "I hope you have a restful weekend, and try not to think about me too much. I'm sure it would be embarrassing for you to call out my name…"

"Fuck you, Jack," I replied venomously. "I'm going to forget about you as soon as I turn around."

I left him standing in the doorway as I pushed through the door and marched across the street to my car.

I was a split-second away from coming undone and I needed the privacy of my vehicle to do it.

"You know, there's no statue of limitations on murder!" Jack called out to me, apparently having followed me outside.

_Murder? _

What the hell was he talking about?

I didn't ask. He was trying to lure me into a longer conversation, and I couldn't do it.

Not when I was on the verge of a panic attack.

So instead of asking questions, I flipped him off without looking back, and then with shaky hands, I pulled out my keys and unlocked the door.

TBC...


	4. Chapter 4

**Ross POV**

* * *

><p>"Kitty-flipping?"<p>

"It means he was doing a mixture of ketamine and ecstasy," Liz said quietly. We were watching through the window as Bobby tried to get Jeremy to open up. "And it would explain the holes in his memory."

"What else would it do?"

"That depends on how much he took and the method he used…"

"Liz," I interrupted. "Don't sugar coat it."

"Okay," she said hesitantly. "Short-term effects include confusion, disorientation, shifts in perception of reality, dissociation of the mind from the body…"

"Can it turn him into a killer?"

"You don't really think he did it."

"I'm trying to be a cop right now instead of a parent. He was found lying next to the victim. They were inside of a locked room and he was covered in her blood. And apparently, he was off his rocker on mind-altering drugs."

"Ketamine normally inspires a sense of serenity," she said. "It's not usually associated with violent behavior."

"What about when it's mixed with ecstasy?"

She didn't answer because we saw Alex enter the room and we wanted to hear what she had to say.

Of course, she had to consult with Bobby first, so while it was quiet in the other room, I turned my focus onto Jeremy.

He looked like hell.

He was pale and shirtless, with blood still dried on his chest and arms.

When he'd been arrested, he'd been wearing only his underwear. The cops had bagged his clothes for evidence, but they'd let one of the boys in the frat house help him into a pair of sweatpants before they brought him to the precinct.

"Why don't you let Bobby and Alex be the cops and you be the parent," Liz said, settling her hand on my back. "That's why we asked them to come. Right now, you have to believe that he wouldn't do something like this, high or not. You raised him right, Danny."

"I barely raised him at all."

"That's not true," she argued, but then she trailed off as the door to the observation room came open.

My ex-wife stood in the doorway, looking every bit as if she'd been crying during the entire six-hour drive from Albany to Baltimore.

"Nancy," I began, but before I could say another word, she crossed the room and slapped me across the face.

"You bastard," she spat. "This is all your fault."

"Wait a minute," Liz said, stepping up between us. "Nancy, I know you're upset…"

"And you have no right to be here," Nancy said, looking at Liz derisively. "You're not a part of this family. And you," she said, turning back to me. "If you would've spent five minutes being a father instead of flashing your badge and chasing after this tramp…"

"That's enough," I said sharply. "You need to get a hold of yourself before you say something you'll regret."

"Like what? Like remind you that you're an absentee father?"

"Yeah, well he called me when he got into trouble, didn't he?"

"Because you're a cop, Danny," she said with heavy sarcasm.

I didn't argue with her because she was right about that. Jeremy had been pretty clear about the fact that he didn't want me here, and yet he'd called. That told me he only wanted me for what I could do for him professionally.

"I'm not going to get into a pissing match with you while our son's being interrogated," I said, quietly but with venom. "And I'm not going to tolerate you being a bitch to Liz, so you can either work with us to help Jeremy, or you can drive the hell back to Albany."

I didn't wait for a response, but instead turned my back on her and focused on the scene in the other room.

"_**My prints are really on the screw driver?" **_Jeremy asked_**. **_

"What's he talking about, Danny?" Nancy asked, suddenly timid again after her vicious outburst.

"Shh," Liz responded, and I had to give her points for taking Nancy's abuse. If it had come at any other time, I had no doubt that Liz would've mopped the floor with her, but considering the situation, she was cutting her some slack.

"_**Screw driver?"**_ Bobby repeated.

Oh, shit.

I knew that tone and I knew that look that he and Alex just shared.

I felt the bile rise up in my throat, knowing exactly what was going to be said next.

"_**How did you know the murder weapon was a screw driver?"**_

"_**I didn't. I mean, I don't know. It is, isn't it?"**_

"_**We're asking how you know that, Jeremy," **_Alex said softly.

"_**I don't know," **_he answered. He stared hard at the table and then he looked back at Alex. _**"Oh, my God. I did it. I killed her, didn't I?"**_

"What's he saying?" Nancy asked, her voice bordering on hysterical. "I thought these people were supposed to be your friends, Danny! Why are they getting him to confess?"

"They're on our side," Liz answered. "But we can't help him if we don't know the truth."

"But they just got him to say he did something that he didn't do!"

"We don't know that, do we?" I replied. "I mean, did you know he's been doing drugs? And getting drunk at frat parties?"

"Did you?" she retorted quickly.

"I'm just saying…maybe we don't know him as well as we thought."

"You don't know him at all," she said fiercely. "When was the last time you saw him? Or even talked to him?"

"Nancy, this isn't the time," Liz admonished.

"So I'm supposed to just stand here and keep my mouth shut while the two of you help to ruin his life? I'd say you've done a good enough job at that already, Doctor."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"He told me that you gave him condoms. When he was seventeen!"

I closed my eyes and sighed deeply, wishing that I could make my ex disappear. She'd never been very good in a crisis.

I started to respond to Nancy, but Liz beat me to it.

And honestly, she was probably in a better place to be objective at the moment.

"I gave him condoms because he was having sex," Liz told her pointedly.

"So by all means, make it a little easier on him."

"He came to me, Nancy. Should I have turned him away?"

"You should've told him to talk to _me_. I'm his mother, not you."

"I'm not trying to be his mother. I'm trying to be his friend."

"Some friend."

"Nancy," I said firmly, deciding that I'd heard enough. "Either shut the hell up or get out. I need to hear what's going on and your incessant harping isn't helping anyone."

"Harping?" she replied shrilly.

I turned around and glared at her, cutting off whatever else she was going to say. She scoffed loudly and then shook her head.

"Fine. Whatever. Let's listen while your _friends_ send our son to death row."

"There's no Baltimore PD in here," I reminded her as though I was speaking to a child. "This isn't for their benefit. It's for ours so that we know how best to help him."

I turned my back on her again and watched as Jeremy wiped tears from his eyes.

"_**Tell us what happened,"**_ Bobby said.

"_**I don't know, but…how did I know it was a screw driver? And my prints are on it. I did it. I did it. I killed her."**_

Jeremy looked up at the glass and it felt like he was looking directly into my eyes, even though there was no way that he could see me.

He was completely unglued now and I couldn't just stand by anymore.

"He needs a lawyer," Nancy said as I pushed past her on my way to the door. "Did you call one? Danny?"

I ignored her and instead looked back at Liz as I opened the door.

"Call Connie," I told her. "Get her advice. She got Mike and Carolyn out of that jam a few months back."

I didn't wait for Liz's response because I knew she'd do it, and I knew she'd understand my rush to get into the other room.

"Don't say another word, Jeremy," Alex was advising him as I entered the interrogation room. "Don't talk to anyone but me or Detective Goren, okay?"

"Dad," my son said as he got up from the table.

Gone was the sullen kid from only an hour ago. He was suddenly thirteen again as he walked over to me and let me hug him.

Alex and Bobby got up from the table, but stood back to give us a minute.

"It's okay," I told him. "We'll figure this out."

"I think I might have done it," he said as he cried against my shoulder.

"Don't say that. Let's get all of the facts first."

I held him for a minute longer and then I pulled away.

"Sit back down," I told him. "I'll be right back."

I walked out into the hall with Bobby and Alex, who both looked at me worriedly.

"It doesn't mean that he did it," Alex said.

"We need to go out to the scene. Did you clear the way for us?"

"I called in a favor," I told them. "You'll have full access, but in the capacity of private investigators, not cops. Don't show your badges."

"Okay," Bobby agreed with a nod.

Liz came out into the hall, tucking her phone back into her pocket.

"Connie said she'd be here in a few hours," she told me.

"She didn't need to come down. I just wanted a referral."

"She insisted," Liz told me.

"Okay," I conceded.

I was going to take whatever help I could get.

"And Liz," I added. "I'm sorry about..."

"I've taken down killers, Danny. Do you honestly think I'm going to let your ex-wife get to me?" she asked in that wonderfully smartass tone of hers that I love almost as much as I love her.

Even more, I loved her for being so understanding because I really needed her beside me for this.

"Nancy's here?" Alex asked.

"She got here a few minutes ago, and she's laying on the blame with an eight-foot wide paint brush, so you might want to steer clear of her," I replied.

"I'm with Liz," Alex answered. "Nancy's an amateur. Don't worry about it."

"She can be vicious," I warned.

"Yeah, well, so can we."

"You stay with Jeremy," Liz told me, and then she looked at Bobby and Alex. "You two have the preliminary ME's report?"

"Yeah, and he's got the girl on the table now," Bobby answered. "He said he should finish up by two o'clock."

"Maybe I'll make a trip by the morgue."

"Just observe," I reminded her. "We don't want anyone to accuse us of skewing the evidence."

"I know. I'm just going to make sure he does a thorough job."

She kissed me quickly and then headed off down the hall.

"So you two are going to the scene?" I asked.

"Uh huh. I don't like that whole locked-room scenario," Bobby said, and I could tell by the look on his face that he was already trying to piece together the sequence of events. "You know, I want to ask Jeremy one more thing. I'll be right back."

He left Alex and me alone in the hallway, and I leaned against the wall and took a deep breath. I had no idea why Nancy was staying in the observation room, but I was glad for it. I didn't need her out here creating more discord.

"How are you holding up?" Alex asked me quietly.

"This just doesn't add up," I said. "I'm trying to be open-minded…I know there's a lot about my son that I don't know, but murder? Are we sure he was never told about the screw driver?"

"That's what the arresting officer stated," she answered. "That was one detail that they decided to specifically leave out. But, you know…"

"Mr. Ross?" an officer interrupted as he joined us in the hall.

"It's Chief Ross," Alex corrected before I could respond.

And then she subtly shifted so that she was between the officer and me.

_My personal guard dog_, I thought.

How many times had she done the exact same thing for Bobby? I felt honored that now I rated such protection because one-armed or not, Alex was a formidable opponent.

And honestly, my head was a mess at the moment. If she wanted to fight my battle for me, then I was going to let her.

The officer took one step backwards and hesitated briefly.

"We need to get a statement from his son," the officer said carefully, directing his statement to Alex, but nodding his head towards me.

"He's invoked his right to an attorney," she told him. "She'll be here in a few hours. Until then, he's not talking."

"Ma'am, you can't invoke for him," he responded. Then he looked at me and added, "And you can't either. He's an adult."

"Come here," Alex said roughly, stepping across the hall to stand in front of the interrogation room door.

She knocked loudly, presumably to let Bobby know to stop talking, and then she whipped open the door.

"Jeremy, do you want to talk to this officer or are you going to wait for your attorney?" she asked confidently.

"I want my lawyer," Jeremy answered.

"There you go," Alex said, closing the door. "So leave him alone until she gets here."

The officer looked at her in frustration and shook his head.

"We're supposed to be on the same side here," he told her. "You're a detective, right? That kid in there…he killed that girl. The jury's not going to have to debate guilt. The only question for them will be whether or not to put him to death."

"You need to watch those slam dunk cases," Alex warned him. "Sometimes they bite you in the ass."

"You're going to tell me he's innocent?"

"I'm going to investigate before I make that determination. You might want to think about doing a little bit of that yourself."

The cop scoffed at her and walked away, and I leaned my head back against the wall.

"Thank you," I told her. "Alex…"

"Let us go check out the scene. You know if there's something there to be found, Bobby will find it. We'll talk more when we get back. In the mean time, just keep an open mind and let him talk about…whatever. As the hangover wears off, he may start to remember."

TBC...


	5. Chapter 5

**Connie POV**

* * *

><p>It was two-thirty when I parked outside of the Northeast Baltimore precinct.<p>

The drive felt like it had taken forever, but considering the fact that Liz's call had come in only a few minutes before eleven, I thought I was doing pretty good.

"_I'm sorry to bother you on a Saturday morning, but we need some advice," _she'd said when I answered.

I glanced around the kitchen as Bernard and Hayes made a visual pass of the room, looking for signs that an intruder had been in our apartment, and then I stepped into the living room, grateful for the distraction.

"_I'm guessing it's law advice, since you're calling me."_

"_Unfortunately, yes. Danny's son was arrested, and we need the name of a good defense attorney in Baltimore."_

"_I'm a member of the Maryland bar."_

"_I know, but Connie…the charge is murder."_

That was all she'd had to say.

I promised her that I'd drive down and look into the situation. I wasn't sure if I was up for the task of defending him myself, but at the very least, I could be co-counsel so that I could remain up to speed on all of the evidence and the attorney's plan of attack.

I got the information on the specific precinct and then hung up with her and went to change clothes.

"_Is everything okay?" _Lupo asked, following me into the bedroom.

_"Not really, no. I need to drive down to Baltimore to help Ross' son."_

I filled him in on what little I knew.

_"Do you want me to come with you?"_

_"No,"_ I said on a sigh. "_I'll be busy and you still need to go see Mulder."_

_"Yeah,"_ he agreed as he put his arms around me. _"Although Bernard's pretty sure that no one actually came in here."_

_"You were pretty sure about that, too."_

_"I know…it's just...I trust his unbiased opinion more than my own right now."_

_"I trust _you_,"_ I asserted. _"You and that gun you put under the mattress."_

_"You know about that, huh?"_ he asked sheepishly.

_"Lupo, I don't fault you for wanting to keep me safe. You just can't ask me to stay indoors under lock and key all day, every day, okay?"_

_"I'm working on it."_

_"And in the mean time, I guess you're glad I'm getting out of town, aren't you? I'll probably stay down there, at least tonight."_

_"Let me see how it goes with Mulder and maybe I'll meet you down there."_

_"I like that idea,"_ I said as I moved away from him and began throwing a few items into a duffle bag.

_"Don't tell anyone else where you're going,"_ he said. "_And don't stop anywhere that's isolated."_

_"I know."_

_"And don't pull over for any cops."_

_"I'm supposed to conduct a safe-speed chase from law enforcement, if one wants to stop me?"_

_"That's exactly right. If that happens, just call me and keep driving."_

_"Lupo…you're being paranoid now."_

_"If he's out there…if he's watching our place, then what if he tries to follow you? And the most fool-proof way to get a woman to pull over is to turn on those flashing lights. It's not paranoid when I can back it up by facts, so please…"_

_"Okay,"_ I agreed. _"I'm sorry. You're right. And I'll drive around the city for a little bit before I head south, too."_

_"That's my girl,"_ he said with a smile.

I'd left a few minutes later, and Lupo walked me downstairs. He scanned the block and looked inside the car and then sent me on my way.

I didn't know who this stalker guy was or why he had a problem with me, but I was starting to hope that he _would_ try something.

I'd be ready for him.

But the drive down was uneventful and as I walked from my car over to the precinct, I shifted my focus to the current situation.

I'd never met Ross' son, but I knew that he was a freshman at Johns Hopkins. It was a tough school to get into, which said something about the boy.

"Connie!"

I turned around and saw Alex and Bobby approaching.

"Liz didn't tell me that you two were down here," I said, accepting a hug from Bobby and then reaching out to lightly hug Alex.

"We're hired as investigators," Bobby explained. "We just got back from the scene."

"Well, I know next to nothing at this point, so let's go inside and meet up with Ross and Liz and then we'll go over the whole story. Then I'll sit down and talk with the boy. Do you know if he's made a statement to the police?"

"He hasn't said anything," Alex answered as the three of us walked into the station. "He's a smart kid. They put him in cuffs and brought him here, and he insisted on making his phone call."

"Good," I said. "I'd hate for there to be a spontaneous confession."

"Well…" Bobby hedged quietly as he led us down a side hall.

"He confessed?" I asked in surprise.

"To us," Alex said.

"So he did it?"

"We're not sure, but we've definitely got our work cut out for us."

Thirty minutes later, the three of us were sitting around a table in a conference room in the precinct. Ross was out in the hallway talking to his ex-wife and Liz was still at the morgue.

Bobby and Alex had given me the brief rundown on their earlier conversation with Jeremy.

"I almost forgot," Alex said, looking at Bobby. "What did you have to ask Jeremy about? When you went back into the room."

"I asked him if he was in the habit of having unprotected sex with his girlfriend."

"I hope you asked him quietly, since Nancy was still in the other room."

"I did," he agreed with a smirk. "And he said no. In fact, he told me that Liz had him scared straight about that."

"Liz?"

"He didn't get into details, but yeah."

"So…why did he last night? The semen was a match."

"I asked him that same question. He said he didn't even remember having sex."

"Maybe he'll remember more now that the drugs have started to wear off," I suggested. "And by the way, what's the deal with the ex?"

When we'd first arrived at the station, she and Ross had been in a heated discussion.

Well, if you could call something so one-sided a discussion.

I'd interrupted by introducing myself in an effort to save him from what sounded like a verbal beat down, and then the woman had instead turned her rage onto me.

_"You're the lawyer?"_ she'd asked skeptically, and then she looked back at Ross. _"Really, Danny?"_

_"What?"_ he'd asked.

_"Oh, this is just classic,"_ she scoffed as she raked her eyes over me. _"I wonder what Liz thinks of you."_

_"We're all friends, actually,"_ I replied stiffly. _"That's why I came down here to help."_

_"Danny doesn't have friends,"_ she'd retorted. She glanced at Bobby and Alex and continued, "_He has detectives who want to kiss his ass and he has women he wants to lay. And since you're not a detective…"_

_"Excuse us for just a minute,"_ Ross said sharply, grabbing onto Nancy's arm. He led her further down the hall and I'd stood slack-jawed for a moment before forcing my feet into action and following Bobby and Alex into the conference room.

"She's having some difficulties lately," Alex said vaguely in answer to my question. "Her latest husband left her last summer and according to Liz, Nancy made a half-hearted attempt to get Ross back, and then when that didn't work, she ended up taking the boys and moving out of the city."

"Well, she's got quite a mouth on her. I can't picture him being married to someone like that."

"She's taking out her anger on him," Bobby explained. "She's upset about Jeremy, and Ross is an easy target."

"She hasn't even been in to talk to Jeremy yet," Alex added. "She's so pissed off at him for calling Ross after he got arrested."

"That sounds like the first smart thing I've heard this kid do," I said. "Okay, so the frat house…what's the deal with this locked-room theory?"

"It's bogus," Alex answered. "I mean, yes, it was locked and the type of lock on the door has to be engaged from the inside, but there are two windows in the room, neither of which were locked, and it's only on the second floor."

"Okay, good," I said as I made notes on a legal pad. "And you said you asked Jeremy about his practice of using condoms?"

"Yeah, he said always, every time, since he was seventeen."

"Except last night. Did he have any with him? In his wallet?"

Alex flipped through the file she'd amassed until she found the log sheet of items put into evidence.

"His clothes were bagged at the scene," she said. "His wallet was still in the back pocket of his jeans…twenty-three dollars, driver's license, Amex card, student ID, and three condoms. Look, Bobby. Trojan Fire and Ice."

"Fire and ice?" I questioned. "That's a condom?"

"I'll give you a class on that later," Alex said with a smirk. "But yeah, it is, and we found an empty foil packet under the mattress, only it was a different brand."

"Well, it could've been there for months," I said reasonably.

"Or not, and it belonged to another man in the room last night," Bobby posed. "We bagged it, but I had to hand it off to Baltimore PD. We can't process any of the evidence."

"Had the entire room been dusted? Window sills and door knobs? Toolbox lid?"

"There was black powder everywhere," Alex confirmed. "They snagged several partials from around the room, but the windows came up clean."

"Clean? In a frat house?"

"Exactly," Bobby said with a nod.

"It doesn't exonerate him, but it does leave room for another perpetrator," Alex said.

"I'll take it. Okay, so back to the murder weapon. The police brought in the screw driver and the only prints on it were Jeremy's?"

"No, there were also prints for the boy who owns the screw driver. Payton Gantano. According to witness statements, Payton was passed out cold on the front lawn by eleven o'clock. Kelly and Jeremy were seen downstairs as late as midnight."

Ross came in the room, momentarily stalling our discussion.

"I'm sorry, Connie," he said immediately.

"Please," I deflected. "It's fine. She's upset."

"She's gone completely psycho," he corrected.

"She's scared," I corrected, although I wasn't sure that's all it was. Lashing out from fear was usually a short-lived response. It sounded like Nancy had been abusing everyone all day. "Where's your other son? How's he holding up?"

"She left Aaron in Albany with friends," he said in irritation. "She didn't tell him anything. He's seventeen, and she's treating him like he's five."

"Where is she now?" Alex asked him.

"She's probably insulting everyone in the squad room," he replied sharply. Then he shook his head and said, "I don't know where she went. She said she had to get out of here. She hasn't even been in to see him. Can you believe that?"

"I think I'd like to go talk to him now," I said. "If that's okay with you. I want to hear the story again, this time directly from him, and then I'll call the DA. I want to see how soon they can get his arraignment scheduled. Maybe we can get him out on bail by the end of the weekend."

"You think you can get bail on a first-degree murder charge?"

"I'm not making any promises, but yes, I think I can get it. It'll probably be a million, maybe two. Can you cover two hundred grand?"

"I'll manage."

"We'll get whatever he needs," Alex said reassuringly. "I'm not above calling John for bail money."

"Let's wait and see how it plays out," I said, although I hadn't thought about John and her suggestion went a long way towards taking some of the pressure off of me.

Bond wasn't always an option. Sometimes the judge required the full amount.

"Have you heard from Liz?" I asked him.

"The coroner finished the autopsy, so she's on her way back here."

"We still need to talk to Kelly's friends," Bobby stated. "And Jeremy's, too. We need to find out who might have a reason to want her dead."

"And who was sneaky enough to try to frame Jeremy," Alex added. "The set-up wasn't an accident. The clean window…the screw driver with his prints…"

"That sounds kind of calculated for college kids," I commented.

"Don't let their age fool you," Ross said.

"He's right," Bobby said quietly. "Johns Hopkins has over twenty thousand students, fifty-two percent of which are males. That means we're dealing with more than ten thousand men between the ages of eighteen and twenty-two. That's the prime age range for a psychotic break, they're pumped full of testosterone in addition to other, synthetic substances, and they all think they're invincible."

TBC...


	6. Chapter 6

**Alex POV**

* * *

><p>"Who's the silver fox?"<p>

I glanced up from my notepad and looked over my shoulder, following the gaze of the female undergrad whom I was questioning.

Bobby.

Of course.

He was further down the hall interviewing other residents of the dorm where Kelly lived.

I bit back a smile and then snapped my fingers in front of her face in order to recapture her attention.

"Hey, we're talking about Kelly, remember?"

"No, _you're_ talking about Kelly. _I'm_ talking about hitting up that George Clooney lookalike."

"It doesn't bother you that your friend was murdered?"

"She wasn't my friend."

"You two have been living together since August. You're not friends?"

"Look, she was a princess, okay?"

"And you're not?" I asked skeptically, taking in her Coach bag and her Prada sneakers. "Let me guess. Those are knock-offs."

"Please," she said dismissively, and then she scanned over my outfit critically and added, "You could learn a thing or two from me."

"No, see, I don't need a lesson from you," I told her with a fake smile. Then I leaned in closer and said, "The silver fox over there? He's mine."

"For real?" she asked, half surprised and half impressed.

"For real. So can we focus now?"

"Yeah, sure, okay."

"So…Kelly."

"She was all in to Jeremy, okay? We used to be friends and then she hooked up with him."

"And you were jealous?"

"Because of Jeremy? No," she said on a laugh. "I can do better. I _do_ better. I just thought she was a little too into him, if you know what I mean."

"No, I'm afraid I don't. Spell it out for me."

"She acted like they were going to get married or something. As if. Does she really think he could support her on a cop's salary?"

"Jeremy wants to be a cop?" I asked in surprise.

That was the first I'd heard about that, and I was suddenly feeling prideful on Ross' behalf.

"That's all he ever talked about, how he was going to be just like his old man."

"So you told Kelly that she could do better, too," I deduced.

"I googled the salary scale of the BPD. Pathetic," she said with disdain.

"You told Kelly about it?"

"I showed it to her."

"When was this?"

"Yesterday morning. We had some time to kill before class."

"How did she react?"

"She acted like it wasn't a big deal, but then she started surfing."

"Looking for what?"

"The NYPD pay scale. He's from there, you know. I guess she thought they make more, I don't know."

"Did you see her after that? Did you go to the party with her?"

"No, I'm not trying to find me a frat boy. All they do is get drunk and talk about the size of their…well, you know."

"I do," I agreed. "So that's not your scene?"

"I had a date," she said after a minute.

"Oh, okay. What's his name?"

"I…really don't want to say."

"I'm not asking, Cierra. I need a name."

"You need an alibi for me?"

"It's standard procedure."

"Shit," she said dramatically as she ran her hand through her hair.

I watched as her eyes strayed towards Bobby again, and that's when it hit me.

"Wait, let me guess. A professor, right?"

She gave me a pained smile and nodded weakly.

"You should re-evaluate that obsession you have with older men," I said, shaking my head. "Give me his name and as long as it's not relevant to the case, no one else will have to know."

I finished up with my portion of the interviews and went outside to wait for Bobby.

I'd had a message on my phone earlier from Carolyn, but I hadn't had a chance to call her back yet, so while I was waiting, I pulled out my phone and made the call.

"I thought we agreed not to bother each other until Sunday," I teased when she answered.

"We did," she replied uncertainly, and I was instantly on alert.

"What's up?"

"Nothing. Mike and I drove to Long Beach for the afternoon."

"Okay," I encouraged. It wasn't like Carolyn to beat around the bush.

"Yeah, so we're just enjoying the day," she continued. Then she said, "Hang on just a second."

I could hear her asking Mike to get them something to drink, and I realized that she was getting rid of him so that we could talk.

That made me even more uneasy.

"I'm sorry that I bothered you," she said when she came back on the line. "I was going to see if you could meet me somewhere…to talk."

"What's wrong?"

"I don't want to get into it over the phone. And we're at the beach now, but maybe tonight…"

"I'm sorry," I interrupted. "I can't. I'm in Baltimore."

"What's going on there?"

I gave her the Cliff notes and then asked her again what was on her mind, because she sounded like she was ready to break.

And not only that, but Carolyn didn't just ask to meet and talk.

If she had a problem, she talked to Mike.

Only this time, she'd deliberately sent him away in order to talk to me in private.

"It's…I just…" she said, and then she broke off and sighed heavily. "You've got a full plate. Don't worry about it. I'll be fine."

"Carolyn…"

"I'm serious. Just pretend I never called."

"I can't do that," I insisted. "What could it be that you can't talk to Mike? Is everything okay with the two of you?"

"As far as he knows, yeah."

My mind was scrambling in an effort to piece her clues together, and then it hit me.

"Does this have something to do with Jack?"

"Why do you ask?"

"Because you got that letter!" I said loudly, and then I got myself under control again. "And I know you – you'd sell your soul if it meant saving Mike a little bit of grief."

"This isn't just a little bit, Alex. It's a lot. It's…"

I heard Mike in the background, apparently having come back from the errand she'd sent him on, and so she quickly schooled her voice.

"Okay, well I'll let him know what's going on," she said casually. "If you need our help, give us a call."

I didn't want to hang up with her, not without having offered some kind of assistance, but I couldn't do that when I didn't know more specifics about the problem, and now that Mike was back, it was obvious that she wasn't going to say anything more.

I quickly went through our list of friends and came up short with who to suggest to her.

Most of us were down here, and Mary was in Albuquerque.

And Carolyn was clearly in a crisis.

"Call Hayes," I told her.

"No," she said carefully.

"Yes. She's trustworthy and she'll be a good sounding board for you. Promise me, Carolyn. Call her as soon as you get a few minutes alone."

She was silent for a minute, and then said, "Tell Ross that we're thinking about him, okay? And seriously, if you need more eyes…"

"I'll tell him. And you call Lauren. Promise me, or when we hang up, I'm calling Mike."

"Okay."

She hung up, leaving me with dial tone after her ambiguous promise.

I looked up at the building where Bobby was still talking to freshman, and since there was no sign of him, I made another quick call.

"Hayes," Lauren answered.

"It's Alex," I said. "I only have a minute, but I need you to do me a favor."

"Sure," she responded immediately, solidifying my opinion of her.

"If Carolyn doesn't call you within the next couple of hours, call her."

"Okay," she agreed.

She didn't ask why.

She didn't ask for the purpose of what.

She just said okay.

"Thanks, I'll owe you," I told her.

I hung up with her just as Bobby came out of the dormitory.

"Any luck?" he asked me.

"Well, I found you a date," I answered as I shoved my phone back into my pocket.

"Is she five-two with blonde hair, and light brown eyes that make me cave to her every whim?"

"No," I said, chuckling lightly at his ability to always make me feel good.

"Then I'm not interested," he answered.

He came to a stop next to where I sat on a stone wall, and so I ran through what I'd learned.

"The roommate says that she had a date with her professor, so she wasn't at the party, but she did give me an interesting tidbit."

I told him about Jeremy wanting to be a cop, and Cierra's mocking of the salary.

"Kelly was thinking long-term? Jeremy didn't act like they were that serious," he commented.

"Well, you know women. We tend to fantasize about the white picket fence."

"It could have caused a fight between them," he suggested.

"Maybe. But then what? They fight about it, and so he picks up a screw driver and kills her?"

"I don't know," he admitted. "The others that I interviewed all said that Kelly and Jeremy were the ideal couple. I found one student who confessed to supplying Jeremy with the ecstasy on Friday. Everyone denied knowing anything about ketamine."

"Yeah, I'm sure he was the only one on campus doing it. What about Kenny? He was in your section, right?"

"Kenny wasn't in his room," he said pointedly. "And his roommate hasn't seen him today."

"Interesting. Did the roommate have any idea as to where he might be?"

"He suggested the library. Apparently it's crunch time at JHU and Kenny's one who hits the books hard."

We headed for the library and I only felt marginally guilty about leaving Bobby in the dark about Carolyn. Of course, I didn't really know anything, but she had me slightly freaked by her panicked tone.

It was definitely _something_.

Carolyn wasn't prone to panic and she didn't normally require a behind-closed-doors session with other women.

Like I said, when she had an issue, she talked to Mike.

And he knew about her prior relationship with Jack.

Although he'd been a typical guy about it, displaying obvious signs of jealousy and ownership when we'd made the trip to Asheville, but still…he'd come a long way since then, and surely she didn't think that he couldn't handle anything Jack threw at them.

But since she wasn't talking to him, I had to trust that Hayes would provide her with a competent ear.

But I still wanted to be there.

Of course, I wanted to be here, too, so…

"That's him," Bobby said as we entered the library. "Upstairs."

He pointed to a balcony section of tables and chairs on the second floor, so we went up one flight and headed for that particular table.

"Kenny Cossman?" I asked as I approached.

I liked for the suspects to look at me first. For some reason, it gave them a false sense of safety.

And I wasn't sure if he was a suspect or not, but I didn't want him to try to run.

So much for that thought.

He took one glance at me, and then shifted his gaze to Bobby, who had circled around to the other side of the table, and then he hopped up and made a run for it.

He shoved past me, catching me off guard and hitting me directly on my left arm.

Pain shot up through my shoulder as I staggered backwards two steps and then righted myself and took off after him.

Bobby was five feet in front of me and ten feet behind the annoyingly fast Kenny.

"Stop!" Bobby called out.

But Kenny kept running, and we didn't want to pull our guns since we weren't cops here, so instead we had to just keep up the pursuit.

Through the stacks, around the wheeled racks of books, and out a side door that led out to the quad.

He was pulling away from us, and if we didn't do something in a hurry, he was going to get away.

I knew that the quad was near the edge of campus, so I took a chance on which way he might go, and I turned off to the right, cutting between two buildings.

My theory was that he'd try to disappear into the streets of Baltimore rather than staying on campus where everyone knew him.

I jumped off a low stone wall and turned another corner, running in front of the building that I hoped Kenny was running behind. When I reached the gap between the two, I pulled my weapon and turned sharply to the left.

"Stop right there!" I shouted as Kenny barreled towards me.

Bobby was on his heels and as Kenny checked his speed, Bobby tackled him from behind, laying him out flat.

I hated not having the right to jerk him into cuffs, but I didn't, so I tucked my gun back into its holster as Bobby pulled Kenny to his feet.

"Why'd you run?" I asked him.

"Are you cops?"

"If we were, you'd be in the back of a black and white right now," I told him.

He looked like he was thinking about taking off again, but Bobby tightened his hold on him and tossed him against the wall for good measure.

"What do you want from me?" he asked.

"Well, ten minutes ago, we just wanted to talk to you. Now I think maybe we need to call the Baltimore police."

"I didn't do anything," he insisted.

"Innocent men don't run," Bobby said.

"What's going on over there?"

It was campus police.

"We're private investigators," I answered to the approaching officer. "We're just talking."

"She had a gun!" Kenny said. "She pulled a gun on me!"

The officer quickly pulled out his radio with one hand and settled the other on his baton.

"Are you armed?" he asked me.

"I'm licensed," I told him.

"Yeah, this is Doug Esterman," he said into his radio. "I'm over here next to Memorial Hall, and I've got two individuals claiming to be P.I.'s…"

"It's not a claim. We are," I insisted as I reached for my credentials.

"Whoa, hold it right there," he said, pulling out his baton. "Why don't you do me a favor and put your hands on the building. You, too. Both of you," he added to Bobby and Kenny. "Let's just get this sorted out."

Kenny immediately complied, and I wondered idly where his eagerness to follow rules had been ten minutes ago.

Bobby rolled his eyes at me and then turned around and put his hands against the brick wall, too.

"Ma'am," the officer encouraged. I glanced down, calling his attention to my sling, and he added, "One hand will be just fine."

I sighed heavily and turned around, muttering, "You have got to be kidding me."

TBC...


	7. Chapter 7

**Lupo POV**

* * *

><p>"This is some seriously crazy shit."<p>

"Tell me something I don't know."

"No, I mean, dude. Seriously. Crazy. Shit."

"Yeah, Mulder," I said with forced patience. "I get it. Can you tell me who sent it?"

"Dude, are you listening to me? That's what's crazy."

I looked up at the ceiling and counted to ten in my head.

It wouldn't do me any good to show hostility. After all, he was working pro bono. He didn't have to tell me anything.

"Hang on," he muttered as he continued typing like a man possessed.

Then he started up a whole stream of dialogue, and I was glad that he only seemed to be talking to himself, because I wouldn't even know where to begin to try to decipher it.

"You call this covert, you kermitnick wannabe? This is romper room. Fucking _twister_. Do you _know_ who you're dealing with here? I'm the gate-keeper, beotch, so take that shit to someone who don't know, right? Oh, yeah. Uh huh…so suck it, haxor."

"Um…Mulder?"

"Yeah, I got ya, dude. You said your chick is an ADA, right? In Manhattan?"

"That's right."

"Well, this email was sent from her office."

"What do you mean it was sent from her office?" I asked sharply as I walked closer to his computer screen.

"See? Crazy. But yeah. And I'm not saying that your guy didn't try to hide it because he did, but you know he can't hide from me, man. He can freemason that shit all he wants to, but I'm like the GLE, you know what I'm saying?"

"No," I said. "So does this mean he was actually in the DA's office? Or that he routed through their IP?"

"Routed through…" he repeated with a grin. "You holding out on me, man? Shit, you _do_ know. And yeah, he was there. I mean, I can't say where in the building, but he was _in_ the building. And he had the nerve to try to make it look like it was coming from _outside_ the building. As if that weak-ass leet shit was gonna fool me."

"He was in the building," I mumbled, mostly to myself. "At three o'clock in the morning."

"Nah, man. Not three o'clock in the morning. He slipped this one the mickey, right? Like, a roofie?"

"He stalled the delivery?" I guessed.

"Uh huh. Twelve hours. You're looking at three o'clock in the _afternoon_."

I left Mulder's home in Secaucus and headed back into the city.

It gave me the creeps thinking about that guy being in the building with Connie.

And here I'd been insisting on her staying _inside_.

_Great, Lupo_.

Keep her trapped inside with the stalker.

I cleared the tunnel and then pulled out my phone to call Bernard.

"What've you got so far?" I asked him.

"I'm working on nothing, Lupes. No one in your building has seen anyone suspicious. If he's been lurking around outside, he's doing a good job of blending in. Did your guy have anything?"

I told him what Mulder had said, although I spoke in plain English.

"We'll go there now and pull the security tapes. Have you thought about telling Cutter?"

"I'm definitely telling him," I said. "I'll meet you there, and we'll go through the tapes together."

I hung up with Bernard and then called Cutter, asking him to meet me.

"I'm already at the office, Detective," he told me amicably. "Come on down."

When I finished talking to him, I considered calling Connie, but then I decided to hold off.

She was safe in Baltimore, and it didn't make any sense to worry her with this latest news.

Not right now, anyway.

With any luck, we might find something on one of the tapes, although considering we had no idea what he looked like…it was going to be a challenge.

As I thought about Connie, my phone buzzed with an incoming text.

_**I'm here, safe and sound. Stop worrying.**_

Yeah, that was going to happen.

It was almost three in the afternoon when I got to the DA's office, and I ran into Bernard and Hayes in the parking lot.

"We've been hashing this out," Hayes said to me as they fell into step beside me. "I don't see how this guy is the killer."

"I'm listening."

"Well, the other two victims were killed within three days of each other. There's no evidence of prior stalking or threats of any kind…and now it's been more than a week since Gingrich was killed."

"She's right, Lupes. Killers don't usually increase the amount of time between kills. If anything, it normally decreases. And the urge to inflict fear prior to killing…we just didn't see that with the other two."

"But with only two victims, can we really determine a pattern?" I posed.

"Maybe not," Bernard conceded. "But there's also the email...the way it's worded."

"What about it?"

"It's an odd choice of words, if he's the killer," Hayes explained. "He says _it's a shame one wasn't you._ Don't you think the real killer would've said something more like _it could've been you_? And he also said _maybe the third time's a charm_. Maybe. If he was the one responsible, he wouldn't have needed to say maybe because he'd know."

"You're going to argue semantics on the writing of a murderer?"

"I'm just saying…I don't think we're dealing with the same person. Of course, that doesn't make it any less dangerous. I think that for some reason the stalker has fixated on Connie. And then he probably read about the murdered ADA's in the paper, and he associated them with her. He figured it would make her even more afraid of him if she thought he'd already killed two people."

"Besides," Bernard added. "We still think our killer's motive is personal as opposed to case-related. I mean, we've got two victims, both males in their mid-thirties, both ladies' men…what are the odds that they were both killed and yet it had nothing to do with the fact that they were both banging the same woman?"

"Which would also point to the fact that the stalker isn't the killer," I admitted.

This was exactly why I'd wanted to call Bernard about the email.

Normally, I would've seen all of the reasons they just explained to me, but I was having a lot of trouble being professional when it was Connie's life at risk.

"We'll still help you go through the tapes," Hayes offered as we cleared security and headed for the bank of elevators.

"That's okay. I'm going to let Cutter know what's going on and maybe he'll look at the tapes with me. He'll be able to better recognize anyone out of place."

"It could be someone who works here," Bernard reminded me. "Just because he's a wacko doesn't mean he isn't gainfully employed."

"That's true," I agreed. "But I have to start somewhere."

"You know, he probably does work here," Hayes said. "Your computer guy said that the effort was made to hide his tracks, right?"

"Uh huh."

"And the threatening phone call came during the business day, but from a payphone only two blocks away. Someone could've easily taken a break and slipped outside to make the call."

She definitely had a point.

I looked at her approvingly, but she was staring at Bernard. It was impossible to miss the look that passed between the two of them as we rode up to the fifth floor.

With all that was going on, I'd completely forgotten that he'd given her a ride home last night.

I wasn't going to ask him about it in front of her, but I would hit him up later.

"I appreciate you two helping me out today," I said, suddenly feeling like a fifth wheel. "I know it's Saturday and…"

"Since when don't we work on a Saturday, Lupes?" Bernard deflected easily, although it took him a few seconds to shift his gaze to mine. "It's no problem, right, Hayes?"

"Right," she agreed. "Since we're here, I'm going to ask Cutter if I can use a computer. I want to run a quick cross-check to see if Connie's name hits with our two other victims. Just to be sure."

"She said that she never worked with them," I told her.

"Yeah, but even if they don't have a case in common, maybe they have a criminal in common. You know, like if he committed a crime in Manhattan and then did something else on the island."

"Or it could be two perpetrators," Bernard added. "Working together to get payback. I mean, we think it's only one, but we don't know for sure."

"It can't hurt to check," I agreed.

The fifth floor was dimly lit, with only a handful of employees at their desks. No one even glanced up as the three of us walked through the room and headed for Cutter's office.

"They all think they're safe in here," I commented quietly. "No one ever thinks that the trouble will come from within."

"You know, it's possible that Connie knows her stalker," Hayes suggested. "If he works in this building, maybe she rebuffed his advances or something."

"That's true," Bernard agreed. "Nothing in any of the threats indicates that it's professional. I mean, we've all kind of assumed that because of what she does, but maybe it's a guy with an unhealthy crush."

"That would explain why he hasn't been in a hurry," I said thoughtfully. "If it was someone she put away, or the relative of someone like that, then they wouldn't play games. They'd just come after her."

"You need to check with her and find out if anyone in the building has been talking to her lately."

I nodded and knocked on Cutter's door.

"Come on in, Detective," he answered. "Or rather, Detectives," he added when he saw all three of us. "I didn't know this was going to be an official meeting."

"Mr. Cutter, this is my temporary partner, Lauren Hayes," Bernard introduced.

"Temporary," he repeated as he shook Hayes' hand. He nodded at me and said, "Did you two have a spat?"

"Hayes and Eames were working with the Gorens on a case and then Bernard and I picked up a case which turned out to be a conflict of interest for me, so the chief assigned Hayes to work with Bernard and Eames to work with me," I explained quickly. "Temporarily."

"Right," Hayes said. "I'm supposed to be out of the 2-7."

"With Eames. Is that Detective Goren's brother?"

"Uh huh."

"And what's the conflict?"

"We're working the Staten Island ADA case," Bernard told him. "Lupo threatened one of the victims."

"Let me guess. Lee Gingrich," he stated.

"You know about him?" I asked in surprise.

I wasn't sure how I felt about the fact that Cutter knew something so personal about Connie, something I'd only very recently discovered.

I take that back.

I _did_ know how I felt about it.

I didn't like it one damn bit.

"What's there to know?" he replied ambivalently. "He's an asshole. Or _was_ an asshole. I'm sorry if that makes me sound insensitive, but I can only guess you two are working through countless potential suspects considering how many people he's pissed off."

"Oh," I mumbled as I realized that he really didn't know anything.

"What'd you think I was talking about?" he asked as he waved at the chairs in front of his desk, offering for us to sit down. "I mean, the other guy – Powers. He was a marshmallow. Good in the courtroom, but everywhere else he was a doormat. I can't see him provoking a threat from a house cat."

"Yeah, it was Gingrich," I said, ignoring the fact that Bernard was now staring at me. I knew he was curious about the purpose for what had gone on between the two of us, but I also knew that he wouldn't ask. "So anyway, you know about the phone call Connie got last week, right?"

"From a payphone down the street," he said with a nod. "Is there a new lead on who made the call?"

"No, but she got an email last night."

Together with Hayes and Bernard, I brought Cutter up to speed on the email, its origin, and how it may or may not relate to the ADA case.

"I tend to agree with Bernard and Hayes," Cutter said when we finished. "Even though the stalker tried to make it sound related, it definitely seems like two different people. So your computer guy…he's sure it came from this building?"

"Uh huh. And he's good," I assured him.

"And that, combined with the closeness of the phone call…" Bernard said leadingly.

"You think it's someone who works here," Cutter said slowly.

"Which would make our suspect pool…"

"Hundreds," he responded as he picked up his phone. He punched a button and paused for a second before saying, "Bring me the personnel files of everyone who works in this building."

He covered the phone briefly and asked, "Are we sure it's a man?"

"I heard his voice on the phone," Hayes said. "It sounded like a man, but I guess it's always possible…"

He nodded and went back to his call.

"I'm in my office. Bring them to me as soon as you can, along with the check-in log from yesterday."

He hung up the phone and said, "We'll cross-match the files with who was on the premises on Friday afternoon. It won't narrow it down significantly, but it will weed some of them out."

"I appreciate this," I said. "We'll get the files and then get out of your hair."

"I don't think so, Detective. One of my own is threatening another one of my own? This is my territory. I'm going to help you find him."

TBC...


	8. Chapter 8

**Liz POV**

* * *

><p>I desperately wanted the ME to come across something cut and dried.<p>

The killer was not Caucasian.

The killer was left-handed.

The killer was a woman.

Something.

Anything that would say definitively that Jeremy was innocent.

But my wishful thinking was just that.

"I was able to pull some specimens from several different subjects off the victim," Dr. Chiu told me as he pulled off his gloves.

He'd been cordial to me since my arrival in his morgue.

In fact, he'd chatted amicably while conducting the exam, although he'd asked if we could refrain from discussing the case at hand until he was finished.

"_So, do you use the en masse technique or en bloc?"_ he'd asked as he used the shears to open the chest cavity.

"_That depends,"_ I answered vaguely as I looked at Kelly's face.

Jeremy was in love with this girl. Or at least, he cared a lot about her.

I could tell that she had been quite pretty.

It probably hadn't even hit him yet that she was dead.

"_Which do you prefer, the eleven blade or the ten?"_

"_Eleven,"_ I said, silently adding, _I'm deadly with it_.

"_Wait, let me guess. You like the seven handle, right? You've got delicately shaped hands. I bet you find the three handle bulky."_

"_You don't get much company down here, do you?" _I asked, finally laughing at his enthusiastic curiosity.

"_In the morgue? Only desperate detectives and grief-stricken family members. Very rarely do I run across someone with a passion for the work. Most of my colleagues are here by happenstance rather than choice."_

"_Not me," _I agreed_. "I was born for this job."_

"_Me, too. The living are far too hostile and judgmental, if you know what I mean."_

"_I know exactly what you mean."_

Thoughts of Nancy instantly sprang to mind.

I knew the woman was upset, but she was so far over the line in her treatment of Danny…well, and not just him, but me, too.

I couldn't think of the last time someone had called me a tramp and lived to tell about it.

It wasn't pity for her that held me back, but compassion for Danny.

He didn't need to witness a cat fight.

Not right now anyway.

But if she kept up her verbal abuse, I wasn't going to be responsible for my actions.

She had a lot of nerve yelling at me for giving Jeremy condoms. Would she rather her son be a teenage father?

He'd come to me because he'd found out that a girl he'd previously slept with had an STD. He'd been in a complete panic, claiming that there was no way he could tell his mother and he really hadn't wanted to tell his father, either.

Danny and I were only newly dating at that time, but I'd met the boy on a couple of occasions and we'd hit it off.

So when Jeremy asked me to test him for the STD, I did.

And I kept it a secret.

But while we waited for the results, I pulled out a few textbooks and showed him pictures of what certain diseases could do to the male genitalia.

It wasn't pretty, and he got my point.

Then I'd covertly handed over half a dozen condoms, and then firmly told him that if he was old enough to have sex, then he was old enough to be responsible and buy his own from then on out.

I _did_ tell Danny that I'd supplied his son with contraceptives, but I never mentioned the STD scare.

Considering this, it bothered me to know that he'd had unprotected sex with Kelly. Drugged out or not, I thought I'd taught him better.

"What kind of specimens?" I asked Chiu in reference to his declaration.

"Hairs…fibers…"

"Semen?"

"Only that of the suspect," he answered. "And there's something unusual about that, too."

"Meaning what?"

"The amount recovered," he began as he tossed his gloves into the collection bin. "It was…much less than I would have expected."

All kinds of explanations ran through my mind, but he waved me off.

"I know what you're thinking," he continued. "But what I mean is that the evidence suggests that the intercourse occurred moments before her death. In the position she was found…"

"I get the picture," I said. "So…moments before. He finished and then immediately picked up the screw driver?"

"Or he already had it in his hand."

"So what's your theory for the lack of ejaculate?"

"This," he said, picking up his clipboard and pointing at one of the lab results. "Traces of spermicide."

"A condom was used."

"Uh huh. A defective one, but still…"

Why did that fact make me feel a little better?

I wasn't sure because it certainly didn't prove his innocence.

Although maybe it told me that even stoned, Jeremy was still in his right mind.

And in his right mind, he would never exhibit violence, especially against a woman.

Dr. Chiu was kind enough to allow me unfettered examination of his findings, even though he was certainly under no obligation to do so.

I committed the report to memory, paying special attention to one section in particular, and then thanked him profusely and headed back to the precinct.

I ran into Nancy on my way in.

She was standing out front, smoking a cigarette.

"You're back," she said contemptuously. "I can't escape you, can I?"

"Did you think I wasn't coming back?"

"A girl can dream, can't she?"

I'd planned to ignore her and just go inside, but I couldn't.

And maybe I'd have to apologize to Danny later for my confrontational nature, but in all honesty, he knew about it when he married me.

"Since we have a minute alone, I wanted to clear something up for you," I said as I stepped closer to her.

"Oh, goody. I get to be enlightened by the all-knowing Dr. Rodgers. Or is it Ross? Did you decide that he was good enough to go public? I can't remember."

"What else don't you remember? Did you forget that you're the one who cheated on Danny? That he stayed true to his vows while you plowed your way through one precinct after another? And you call me the tramp…"

"You know why I said that," she fired back. "He and I were going to get back together. We were supposed to be together, to raise our boys as a family. But you wouldn't let him go."

"I did let him go," I told her quietly. "When you came after him, we weren't together."

That silenced her as the meaning of my words finally seemed to sink in.

"You weren't…" she repeated blandly. "But he said…"

"I don't know what he told you, Nancy. All I know is that he told me you asked him about reconciliation last summer."

"I did. And he told me that it was impossible because he was in love with you."

I don't know why it made me feel so good to hear her say that.

Obviously, I know he loves me.

But hearing her say it, and knowing that he'd told her that last summer, when we were having troubles…it actually made me feel really good.

And it made me feel a little bit sorry for Nancy.

I put my hand on her arm and patted her lightly.

"You're letting your anger at Jeremy override your good sense," I told her. "It's okay to be mad at him. And upset for him. And scared for him. All of those things. But all of us down here trying to help him…we're all of those things, too. We need to work together to help him so that this doesn't ruin the rest of his life."

"You think he's innocent?" she asked cautiously.

"I absolutely think he's innocent," I answered with more confidence than I felt. "And the Gorens are the best detectives around. They'll find something to clear him."

I left her outside to finish her cigarette and I went in to find Danny.

He was sitting alone in the conference room, and when he saw me come in, he got up and quickly pulled me into a hug.

"What's going on?" I asked, afraid that maybe something new had happened.

"Connie's here. She's in with Jeremy. She thinks that maybe she can get him out on bail."

"Today?"

"Tomorrow, probably. But I should be able to get the captain to let him stay in lock-up overnight rather than being moved to the jail."

"That's good news," I said.

"I'll have to put up our house," he warned me. "Maybe more."

"We'll do whatever it takes."

I held him for a few minutes longer and then he finally pulled away.

"I'm sorry," he said. "This has just been…too much."

"I ran into Nancy outside," I told him.

"With the car?" he asked with faked hopefulness.

I laughed at him and shook my head.

"She was smoking."

"I like the sound of that. How many years does that take off a person's life?"

"Danny," I chastised, but I was glad to see that his mood was lightening, even if he was making jokes about his ex-wife kicking the bucket. "Anyway, I think she's over the hump."

"I hope so."

"Everyone handles stress differently," I reminded him.

"You're a saint, Liz."

"Chief," Connie called out, sticking her head through the doorway. "I think I'm done with Jeremy for now. I'm going to catch up with the DA and see what I can do about the arraignment."

"Are you the attorney of record?" he asked her.

"For now. If we see that this is going to go to trial, I'll bring in someone local."

"How's he holding up?"

"Better, I think. You can talk to him. I've got a cop bringing him in some dinner, and after that, they'll take him back to lock-up."

"You got the locals to bring him take-out?" I asked in surprise.

"They've been holding him for more than twelve hours and they haven't given him anything to eat. I simply reminded them that that was unacceptable treatment of someone in custody. And that reminds me…I'm betting you two haven't eaten, either, have you?"

"We'll get something in a little while," I assured her. "And thank you so much for coming down."

"No problem. Lupo was actually glad to get rid of me."

"Why is that?"

"I got a threatening email sent to me last night."

"From the same guy?" Ross asked with interest.

"I assume so. I don't know. Lupo's getting his computer whiz to try to track down the origin, but I haven't heard anything from him yet. Oh, did you find out anything useful from the autopsy?"

"There was a lot of trace evidence gathered, but nothing conclusive. There were hairs and fibers, but they could've come from anyone at the party. It does appear as though a defective condom was used, and that TOD occurred quickly after the sexual activity."

"Quickly, like immediately after?"

"Well, it's an inexact science, but fairly quickly. Dr. Chiu thinks within the next several minutes. And the victim had twelve stab wounds, but only the last one was fatal, so…"

"So the several-minute span would have to include the amount of time necessary to inflict a dozen stab wounds," Connie concluded.

"And there's something else," I said, but then I hesitated as Danny and Connie both looked at me, waiting to hear my news. "There was definitely intercourse prior to her death, but then also again later…peri- and post-mortem."

Danny continued to stare at me, but Connie picked up on what I was saying.

"So wait…Jeremy had sex with her, and then supposedly stabbed her to death and then had sex with her again?"

I was glad that she found that fact as odd as I did. I'd hate to think that I was just having trouble being objective.

"Uh huh," I said with a nod. "Only the second time was brutal."

"Liz, do me a favor," Connie said thoughtfully. "Take pictures of Jeremy, will you? I know the cops already did it, but I'd like to get some of our own. And take another set tomorrow morning."

"What are we looking for?" Danny asked.

"Bruising," I said, having picked up on Connie's thread. "Or possibly injection sites."

"You think he was drugged? I mean, even more than what he took on his own?"

"It's a possibility. But I definitely think someone else was in that room."

TBC...


	9. Chapter 9

**Hayes POV**

* * *

><p>It was tough to go from complete and utter sexual gratification to aloof and distanced professionalism, but I managed to make the transformation.<p>

Sort of.

After Lupo's call, we both dressed quickly and then headed for the door.

"I'm going to have to swing by my place," Bernard said. "I can't go over there in the same clothes I wore last night."

"That's fine," I agreed. "It won't take but a few extra minutes."

I flicked off the lights and then grabbed onto the doorknob, but Bernard stopped me before I could open the door.

"Last night…" he began, and then he trailed off hesitantly as if he wasn't entirely sure what else he wanted to say.

"Did we do something last night?" I asked him as I smiled slowly. "Because I'm not sure if I can remember. You know, because of all that tequila."

"Oh, is that how you're going to play it?" he replied, catching on to my tease. He reached up and lightly grabbed onto my ponytail as he stepped closer to me.

"I think so, yeah. I think maybe tonight we'd better see if we can recreate it…you know, just so that it'll stick out better in my mind."

"Maybe this will spark your memory," he said as he leaned in to kiss me.

It was soft and playful and utterly arousing, and we let it go on for a few minutes before he finally pulled away.

"Anything?" he asked with a quirk of his eyebrow.

"Bits and pieces," I answered, trying to play it off, but the breathlessness of my voice surely gave me away.

If it weren't for the fact that Lupo needed our help, I'd still have him in my bed.

Because, of course, I had perfect recall of every moment of our night together and I found myself having trouble concentrating over the course of the day.

I mean, I _did_ concentrate.

And I thought I made several astute determinations about the relationship between Connie's stalker and our killer.

But any time I had a few minutes of time for my mind to wander, it went straight back to last night.

Honestly, I hadn't planned on things progressing so quickly. When I invited him up, I'd been sincere in my request.

I'd simply wanted to kiss him without the restrictiveness of the vehicle.

But I'd underestimated the effect he'd have on me, and within minutes of getting him inside, all I could think about was taking it to the next level.

And maybe I wasn't being fair to him, considering I hadn't offered full disclosure about certain, personal aspects of my life.

I hoped that my impulsiveness wouldn't come back to bite me in the ass, but at the moment, I had to shove that worry out of my mind.

We'd get around to talking more. I definitely wanted him as more than just a means of relieving sexual tension, so the deep, revealing conversations would surely come to pass before too much longer.

I recognized the possibility that maybe I was trying to preclude getting dumped…I was trying to make sure that he _really_ liked me before I opened up with the backstory that always, without fail, sent men packing.

I had to hang on to the hope that Bernard was different, but in case he wasn't, I suppose I wanted to allow myself some selfish pleasure before he called it quits.

We'd been working in Cutter's office for almost an hour when my cell phone rang. I decided that it was a good time to stretch my legs, so I stepped outside to answer the call.

"Hayes."

"It's Alex. I only have a minute, but I need you to do me a favor."

"Sure," I answered, although I couldn't imagine what kind of favor that she'd be asking of me.

Carolyn was usually her go-to girl, followed by Liz.

"If Carolyn doesn't call you within the next couple of hours, call her," she said firmly.

"Okay," I replied quickly.

I had no idea about the purpose of the call, but I figured I would play it by ear.

I also grasped what Alex _didn't_ say.

This call wasn't going to be common knowledge. In fact, I was pretty sure that it would just be between me and Carolyn and Alex.

"Thanks, I'll owe you," she replied.

_She_ was going to owe _me_.

As if I didn't already owe her for…well, for all kinds of things.

Ultimately, it had been her willingness to bring me and Eames in on the Tomlin case that had set my life on a different course.

I now had friends.

And I had Bernard.

And I had a nice feather in my jacket from that case.

Alex could've just as easily taken that case and walked out of the 2-7 without looking back.

And yeah, Eames was her brother, so I had no doubt that he was the reason she wanted to help.

But still…she and Goren had taken us both under their wings, leading by example and patiently explaining their thought processes as the four of us worked together to catch the killer.

And I was well aware that I had a bad case of hero-worship, but I figured if I was going to model myself after someone, then she was a good candidate.

I went back into Cutter's office and ignored Bernard's questioning look.

"Do we have anything yet?" I asked as I sat down and picked up my stack of files.

"We really need Connie here for this," Cutter said. "I mean, we can't even definitively weed out the females, so the list isn't shrinking much just from pulling out the ones who weren't here on Friday. But if she can think about anyone who maybe tried to strike up a conversation with her, or was staring at her…"

"You think he's going to be that blatant?" Lupo asked.

"I'd bet it started out that way," Bernard said. "An innocent infatuation. And then when she rebuffed him, it turned into something ugly."

"Are we completely off the theory that it's someone she put away?" Cutter asked.

"I'd say it's definitely back-burner," I replied. Lupo and Bernard both nodded, and then Lupo checked his watch.

"I think I'm going to drive down to Baltimore," he said. "I'm going to ask her about it."

"You know, you don't have to make the drive. There _is_ such a thing as phones, Detective," Cutter said, and I was surprised to see that he was joking with Lupo. Cutter seemed like such a no-nonsense guy, and I wouldn't have guessed that he had a sense of humor.

"Yeah, I've heard of those," Lupo joked back as he stood up and grabbed his jacket. "But they're not good for anything but talking."

"Get out of here," Cutter said, waving him off. "You want me to meet you back here tomorrow?"

Bernard and I got up, too, and Cutter walked us all to the door.

"I'll be back in town around noon," Lupo said.

"Okay. I'll be here."

"He's nicer than I expected," I admitted as we got onto the elevator and headed for the lobby.

"He's a work in progress," Lupo replied.

"He had a thing for Connie," Bernard added.

"Oh. Did they date?"

"No, but not for lack of trying on his part."

"Well, I'd say that he's being a good sport about coming up short."

We parted ways with Lupo in the parking garage, and then Bernard turned to me.

"Are you up for going into 1PP for a little while? I've got some thoughts about our ADA killer. I figured as long as we're in work mode, maybe we can run down a few electronic leads."

So we went to work and started scouring through the life of Amanda Evans.

She was the married women who was sleeping with both Powers and Gingrich.

Bernard hadn't mentioned what he was hoping to find. I think he wanted to validate his theory by having me reach the same conclusion.

Although, so far, I hadn't reached anything.

At five o'clock, my cell phone rang, so I begged off work for a moment and slipped into an empty conference room to answer it.

It was Carolyn. She'd taken it down to the last half-hour before I was supposed to call her.

"Hayes," I answered, trying to decide if I was supposed to pretend like I wasn't expecting her call.

"It's Carolyn. Am I catching you at a bad time?"

"I'm at 1PP, but I'm past due for a break."

"Alex called you, didn't she?"

I really wished that I knew both of them well enough to know how to answer that question, but I didn't.

And then I decided that maybe I did.

Because they were both extremely honest people.

"Yes," I answered.

"How much longer did I have?" she asked, sounding slightly amused.

"Thirty minutes," I replied. "Is everything okay?"

"No, not really," she admitted on a sigh. "I could use an unbiased ear. How much longer are you going to be working?"

"I'm not sure. We're on our own time, so I can leave whenever."

"Bernard is with you?"

"Not right at the moment, but yeah, we're working together."

"Maybe you could come by my place."

"Okay," I said slowly, already racking my brain to decide what I would tell Bernard.

I was pretty sure that I didn't like all of this subterfuge, but it must be important, and since Carolyn was seemingly willing to trust me, I wasn't going to let her down.

"Do you guys have plans for dinner?" she asked me.

"Not so far."

"Let's get together, the four of us. Come on over to my house first and we'll have a drink or something. Tell Bernard to meet us at Steve-O's in a couple of hours."

So I hung up with Carolyn and went back into the squad room.

"Carolyn and Logan want to have dinner with us tonight," I said quietly.

"That works," he agreed, still reading something on his computer.

"So…I'm going to head home and clean up a little and then I'll meet you at Steve-O's, okay? Seven-thirty?"

He pulled his eyes away from his monitor and looked at me curiously.

"Is everything okay?"

"Yeah, it's fine. I'm just…well, I didn't get to shower this morning, and I should at least pat Janis on the head for a minute before ditching her again."

"Okay," he agreed. "Seven-thirty. I'm going to finish looking over Amanda's credit card statements, and then I'll get out of here, too."

I left him and headed for the elevator, but on the way down, I sent Bernard a text. I didn't want him to think that my hasty departure had anything to do with him.

_**Bring a change of clothes. We can spend the day together tomorrow **_**not**_** working.**_

I took the subway home and made over Janis, and then I breezed in and out of the shower. I was back at the subway station twenty minutes after leaving it, heading for Carolyn's house.

I couldn't imagine what was going on with her, and I felt bad that she had to talk to me by default, but at the same time, I was glad that she felt like she could.

"Hayes," Logan greeted after I knocked on their door. He was barefoot, and dressed in shorts and a t-shirt. "Come on in. Carolyn said you might stop by. Where's Bernard?"

"He was finishing up with credit card statements on our victims' mistress," I said as he stood back and let me into their place. "He'll meet us at Steve-O's."

"Yeah, how's that ADA thing coming?"

"It's stalled at the moment, but we'll get it. Connie got another threat last night."

"She did?" Carolyn asked as she came into the room. "What kind of threat?"

So I told them about the email and how we'd spent half the day in the DA's office.

"I'm with you," Carolyn agreed. "They don't sound related."

"Uh huh," Logan said with a nod. "The other guys didn't get any threats. And Connie's threats started even before the first murder. Why threaten her and then kill two different people?"

"Exactly."

"I'm going to go jump in the shower," Logan said. "I've got sand in unmentionable areas."

"You guys went to the beach?" I asked Carolyn after Logan went upstairs.

"Long Beach," she said, and her lightheartedness from moments ago was completely gone. "Come on, let's go in the kitchen. Do you want a drink?"

"No, I'm fine," I declined. I followed her into the kitchen and waited while she poured herself a stiff drink.

"Thanks for coming over," she said. "I'm at a loss as to what to do."

"Tell me how I can help."

"I can't go into the whole backstory now, because we don't have enough time, but…"

And then she told me about how a former lover planned to blackmail her.

He hadn't yet told her what she would need to do for him, but whatever it was, it was in exchange for him not showing photos to Logan.

"But they're old," I reminded her.

I didn't want to think that she was worried about how something so long in the past might effect how Logan looked at her. Because as far as I was concerned, they were the ideal couple, and if Logan couldn't handle an unsavory past…

"He internalizes things," she explained. "It's not that he'd be upset with me about them, but they'd be forever burned in his mind. I don't want to hurt him like that."

What would Bernard say if he knew about my past? Or should I even tell him? It wasn't the same as this, but…

I had to force myself to keep this about her.

"What do you think this guy wants?" I asked.

"I have no idea, but he mentioned attempting to ruin my life. He also commented on the lack of statute of limitations on murder, but I don't have a clue what he's talking about with that. It's almost like he's throwing things out just to keep me guessing."

I stood still for a moment, unsure of what type of advice to offer.

"I think I'll take that drink now," I said, so she refilled her glass and poured one for me, too.

"I don't like keeping secrets from him. But this time, I don't think I can tell him the truth."

"This guy's going to call you on Monday?"

"That's what he said. He wanted me to stew about it over the weekend."

"Then I would wait and see what it is that he wants before you decide whether or not to tell him. Although…you know, maybe not. He's got the pictures. Do you really think that giving in to the blackmail will make those go away? You're always going to wonder where he's lurking, when he's going to pop up next."

"So I should tell him."

"He loves you. As much as you're trying to protect him, he'll want to do the same for you against this guy. Wouldn't you want him to tell you if it was the other way around?"

"But what if he sees those pictures and…I don't know...never looks at me the same way again?"

"They can't be that bad. And besides, you don't have to show them to him. Just tell him they exist."

"He'll want to kill Jack. Hell, I want to kill him and I'm the calm one."

"So maybe you set him up. Pretend like you're going to go along with it until you know more about his plans and then take him out. Besides, he's on probation, so any little infraction can send him off to prison."

"But that worries me, because it means that whatever else he's going to hold over me is something that he's confident will keep me from talking."

"Neither of you have broken a law. He can spout off about statutes all he wants to, but he can't get you on something you didn't do."

She nodded thoughtfully, and then we heard Logan coming down the stairs.

"Thanks, Lauren," she said quietly. "It's something to think about. I needed someone who could think rationally about this because I'm bordering on freaked out."

"You wouldn't know it to look at you."

"Are you ladies ready?" Logan asked as he came in the kitchen. He wrapped his arms around Carolyn and leaned down to kiss her cheek.

"Let's go."

The three of us walked down the street to Steve-O's, and the two of them teased and bickered good-naturedly with each other the entire way. They were so cute together, but I couldn't help but worry about my own relationship.

Bernard wasn't in love with me.

We didn't have years of history together.

So if she was so worried about Logan's response to her past, then how in the world was Bernard going to respond to mine?

TBC...


	10. Chapter 10

**Alex POV**

* * *

><p>It took us nearly an hour and all of my patience to get the incident on campus sorted out.<p>

Credentials were confirmed, licenses analyzed…

In the end, we questioned Kenny while the three of us sat in the waiting room of the campus security office, after being released from custody.

"Why'd you run, Kenny?" I asked in annoyance.

By this point, my arm was throbbing and my head hurt and I really just wanted to check into a hotel and go to sleep.

Last night's tequila combined with utterly no sleep at all…I was completely out of gas.

"You were chasing me," he said defensively.

"We didn't start chasing you until you ran," Bobby reminded him.

He sounded as exhausted as I felt. It was probably that high-speed foot chase that had done both of us in.

"Look, I know you want to talk about Kelly, and I…just don't have anything to say."

"We'll decide whether or not you have something to say," I argued. "The word on the street is that you had a crush on her."

"Yeah, so? That doesn't mean I _killed_ her."

"We didn't say you did," Bobby replied, perking up a little and looking at me to catch my gaze.

This kid was definitely hiding something, but the question was what.

"Let's settle down and back up a little," I told him. "When was the last time that you saw Kelly?"

"Yesterday. She was at Nolan's."

"And Nolan's is…"

"One of the dining halls."

"So was this at lunch time? Dinner? You know, this'll go a lot faster if you just spell it out for us."

"It was dinner. I went in there around seven-thirty and she was there with a couple of friends. I tried to sit at their table, but her friends spread their stuff out so that there wasn't room for me."

"That must have hurt your feelings," Bobby remarked.

"Hurt my feelings? I'm not a little kid. And I got the hint."

"So that was it? You just walked away and then you never saw her again?"

"She stopped by my table on her way out. She apologized for her friends acting like losers and then she said that she'd see me on Sunday."

"Sunday. So you had a date?"

"We were going to study together. We have the same Philosophy class."

"Philosophy, huh? _Nobody can make you feel inferior without your consent._"

Kenny looked skeptically at Bobby and asked, "You think they made me feel inferior?"

"I'm just quoting Eleanor Roosevelt. _Did_ they make you feel inferior?"

"No. Kelly liked me. She just didn't want to admit it in front of her friends. But she was coming around. I was willing to wait."

"Oh. Well, you know what John Dryden said. _Beware the fury of a patient man._"

"Who is this guy?" Kenny said as he turned toward me. "Some kind of Philosophy junkie?"

"He's a knowledge junkie," I corrected. "So Kelly agreed to meet you on Sunday for a study session. And then she went on her date with Jeremy."

"She was just with him because he's popular," he said derisively.

"Oh, so she was shallow," I said with a nod.

"No! I didn't say that. She was…beautiful and smart and sweet…"

"You were in love with her."

"I don't know. Maybe."

"Do you know what Marc Maihueird says about love?" Bobby asked him.

"Who's that?"

"How long have you been taking this Philosophy class?" Bobby questioned, shaking his head as though disappointed in Kenny. "He said, '_Love is what we call the situation which occurs when two people who are sexually compatible discover that they can also tolerate one another in various other circumstances_.' That's what I'm thinking was the situation with Jeremy and Kelly. They were…sexually compatible. Everything else was just secondary."

"You don't know what you're talking about," Kenny retorted, and I could tell that he was started to get mad at Bobby's suggestion, so I kept it going.

"Well, you're not going to deny that they were having sex," I told him.

"She wouldn't do that."

"She was twenty years old," I reminded him. "You think she wasn't sleeping with her boyfriend?"

He shook his head vehemently, as though he was trying to block out what we were telling him.

"She was going to break it off with him," he said at last. "She told me. She wanted to be with me."

"She told you that? When?"

"Last night, in Nolan's."

"So she casually stopped by your table after letting her friends dis you, and then she says that she's going to dump her boyfriend and start dating you."

"That's right."

"And that was the last time you saw her."

"Uh huh."

"It's been twenty-four hours. And yet you seem okay to me. That's kind of strange, considering you thought you were finally going to get your big break."

"I think I'm still in denial."

I glanced doubtingly at Bobby and then turned back to Kenny.

"Where were you last night between the hours of midnight and two a.m.?"

"You want an alibi from me?"

"That surprises you?" Bobby asked.

"Well…yeah. Jeremy did it, right?"

"We don't know that yet. So where were you?"

"I was in my room."

"Your roommate never heard you come in."

"That's because he was passed out. I got back to the dorms at eleven-thirty and I went to bed. I've been at the library all day today."

We both got up from the table, deciding that we'd gotten all we could from him at the moment.

"Oh, one more thing," Bobby said, pausing halfway to the door and turning back around to face Kenny. "We'd like to get a DNA sample from you."

"What for?"

"Just to rule you out," I assured him. "It's standard procedure."

"Don't you need a warrant for something like that?"

"Not if you're willing to cooperate."

"Well, I'm not. If you want something from me, get a warrant," he stated in a surprising show of defiance.

"You know that makes you look guilty, right?"

"No, it makes me look smart."

An hour later, I finally got my wish of being checked into a hotel room. Bobby closed the door behind us and I let out a fatigued sigh.

"I feel like this has been the longest day of my entire life," I said as I pulled off my shoes. "Doesn't it seem like a year ago when we were on the roof?"

I startled when Bobby grabbed me from behind, picking me up and settling me in his arms.

"Yes, it does. Except a year ago, I was a lonely man."

"So you're saying…"

"Even though it's been exhausting lately, at least we're together."

"There is that," I agreed.

He walked over to the bed and set me down on it and then began to undress me.

"Tonight, it's going to be room service and early bed time, with no interruptions."

"How are you going to pull that off? I mean, you're good, but…"

"I _am_ good. Don't you forget it," he said with a mischievous grin. "All's quiet for tonight. Ross and Liz are heading this way to get a room, and so is Connie. Jeremy's being transferred back to lock-up, and the captain promised to keep him in a cell by himself. Nothing else is going to happen tonight."

"Oh, I need to check in with Carolyn," I said suddenly.

I felt bad that I'd let her crisis escape my attention, even though I'd put Hayes on the matter.

"What's up with her?" he asked. He'd pulled off my socks and was now working my jeans down my legs.

He was moving at a slow, deliberate pace and I found myself tingling with anticipation.

Twenty minutes ago, I would've never considered doing anything but sleeping once we got to this room, but I was already amending that plan to allow time for us.

"I don't know," I admitted.

I didn't want to get into a discussion about Jack with Bobby.

Carolyn was obviously keeping something from Mike, but since I didn't know any details, I wasn't ready to determine what I was going to do with that information.

It kind of put me in a bad situation.

I had to either decide to keep a secret from Bobby, or force him to keep a secret from Mike…

"You don't have to talk about it," Bobby said with understanding.

"At this point, I don't know enough to talk about," I admitted. "But when I do, then we'll see."

He nodded agreeably and tossed my pants onto the chair across the room before shifting his focus back onto me.

"Your shoulder's hurting," he stated as he carefully unhooked my sling. "You look a little pale."

"I've got some ibuprofen in my bag. I'll take a few before we go to bed."

"I'll get them now," he countered. "You stay right there."

I watched him as he walked over to the dresser and unzipped my duffle bag.

"I think you freaked Kenny out a little bit, with all of those philosophy quotes," I commented. "How do you remember that stuff?"

"I don't know. Some things just stick, I guess."

"Interesting choice. Love is all about finding someone sexually compatible?"

"I didn't say that I agree with the words," he said, flashing me a smile as he continued to dig in search of the bottle of pills. He finally found it, and opened it up, shaking three out into his hand and then tossing the bottle back into the bag. "Marc Maihueird said it. Not me."

"Well, your quote certainly struck a nerve with Kenny. Did you see him bristle at the thought of the two of them having sex?"

"We were blowing his illusion."

He went into the bathroom and came back with a glass of water. I sat up in the bed and dutifully took the medicine, and then he put the glass on the nightstand and began unbuttoning my shirt.

"What do you think of him?" I asked.

"Kenny? I wouldn't be surprised to learn that maybe he followed her last night. He was obsessed. Or _is_ obsessed. Her death isn't real to him yet, but I'm not sure if it's because he killed her or just because his relationship with her was based on fantasy anyway."

He slipped my shirt off, so that now I was down to just my underwear, and then he started working on his own clothes. I climbed under the covers and then I watched him as he went through the motions. I was anxious for him to hurry up and get into bed with me.

We hadn't ordered dinner yet, but I was too tired to be hungry. He stripped down to his boxers and then quickly called down to the front desk to schedule a wake-up call.

And then finally, he turned off the lights and crawled into bed next to me.

He eased me up against him and immediately began running his fingers over my back.

"You know I don't believe that quote," he said, his voice a quiet rumble in the darkness. "I can think of a lot more that better quantify our situation."

"Yeah?" I hummed, letting my eyes fall closed as he continued to caress my skin.

"_But to see her was to love her, love but her, and love her forever._"

"I like that one."

"I've got more," he said as he pulled me closer to him.

"I bet you do."

He kissed the top of my head and I wrapped my good arm around him, resting my cheek against his chest.

"How's the shoulder feeling? Kenny pushed you pretty hard."

"Everything feels better now," I promised.

And it really did. The pounding in my head had subsided and my shoulder was down to a tolerable ache.

It was too fast to have improved due to the medicine, so I was going to give Bobby all of the credit. His gentle touch and the feel of his arms around me…definitely better than any drug.

"Let's see if we can avoid chasing after suspects tomorrow," he teased lightly, moving his hand up into my hair.

"Do you think Connie will be able to get the judge to grant bail?"

"I hope so. I'd hate to think what a few months in prison will do to a kid like Jeremy. He was a pain in the ass when we first got here, but he's basically a good kid."

"We'll get him off," I said confidently. "If he's innocent, we'll find the killer. My money's on Kenny."

"Alex," he said, his voice barely a whisper. "Let's talk about the case tomorrow."

"Okay," I agreed, practically purring from his attentions.

"Tonight, I just want to hold you in my arms, because with you, I have everything that I'll ever need in this world."

"Who said that? Byron? Thomas?"

"Robert Goren."

TBC...


	11. Chapter 11

**Logan POV**

* * *

><p>"Do you want to talk about it?"<p>

I said the words in barely a whisper and yet they still seemed loud in the overly-quiet room.

We'd gotten into bed more than an hour ago, but I couldn't sleep and I knew that Carolyn wasn't either.

She was lying on her back next to me, and I was on my side with one arm wrapped around her waist.

But in spite of our physical closeness, I felt like she was miles away.

We'd had a nice dinner with Bernard and Hayes. I hadn't socialized with them much, other than in a larger group, and I found that I really enjoyed their company. Hayes was extremely sharp-witted and out-spoken, and Bernard had a laidback way of delivering one-liners that kept me laughing most of the evening.

Even despite the fact that I was worried about Carolyn.

"Talk about what?" she responded at last.

"Come on, sweetheart. You're a pro. You know better than to answer a question with a question. It indicates a desire to deflect attention."

"Is that what I'm doing?" she asked challengingly.

I sighed and propped my head up on my hand so that I could look at her. The room was mostly dark, but moonlight filtered in through the blinds, throwing lines of blue light across her face.

"You're not going to scare me away," I said evenly. "Something's going on. You sent me on an errand while you were on the phone with Alex…Hayes showed up early, without Bernard…"

"That's your basis for suspecting something's wrong?"

"My basis is that I know you better than anyone in this world. And I know when something's on your mind."

Her body was completely tense, and I decided that maybe I needed to regroup. I hadn't wanted to put her on the defensive.

But I also didn't want her to feel like she needed to keep something from me.

"Relax," I told her as I began stroking my fingers up and down her arm. "If you want to keep your secret, then keep it. I just wish you didn't feel it was necessary."

She exhaled heavily and finally brought her eyes to mine.

"It's not that it's necessary," she said. "I'm just…I'm…I'm scared."

Her admission took me by surprise.

She was scared?

"Of who? Is it Jack?" I asked gently as I moved my hand up to her face. I encountered wetness on her cheek.

She was scared _and_ she was crying.

Fear rolled through me at this revelation because I just couldn't fathom what could have her so upset.

I wanted to turn on all of the lights and force her to tell me everything that was going on, but I didn't.

Instead, I shifted in the bed so that I could pull her into my arms, and then I held her tightly against my chest.

She didn't make a sound, but the tears kept coming, so I stayed quiet and just held her, rubbing my hands over her back.

But on the inside, my mind was racing.

It had to be Jack.

He was the only current variable in our life.

And I'd given her a hard time about him last fall, acting a little juvenile and possessive and not remotely understanding about the fact that she had a _life_ before me.

I'm going to chalk it up to insecurity…insecurity that I no longer felt with her…but still, it might cause her to worry about how I might react to something involving him.

But I couldn't figure out why she would be scared. Carolyn wasn't scared of anyone, and she hadn't shown any signs of fear when she initially received the letter. In fact, she'd nearly convinced me that it was no big deal.

So something had happened between then and now.

Considering I'd just come off a two-week stint as a basket case while working the Watkins case, was it any wonder that she was trying to protect me from something?

But that needed to end.

I didn't need her to be a shield for me.

"I'm sorry," she said quietly without moving away from my chest.

"For needing some comfort and support? That's in my job description," I replied, trying to help her by lightening the mood. "It's something I don't get to do nearly enough, because you're so damn tough…"

"Not so tough," she countered.

I kept holding her while she worked to get herself under control, but I didn't ask her any more questions. I wasn't going to pressure her into talking.

Although I really, really hoped that she would.

"He called me Friday night," she said after several more minutes. "Jack."

I couldn't even begin to imagine their conversation, but already, I wanted to kill him.

Out of respect for her, though, I held back from expressing my thoughts aloud.

And I didn't chastise her for not telling me, even though I wanted to do that, too.

Later, I could remind her that we don't keep secrets from each other.

But not now.

"And what did he say?" I asked calmly.

"He wanted to meet up with me. He said that he had something I'd want to see. And that I shouldn't tell anyone about the meeting."

"That's where you went at lunch today," I stated. "You met Jack."

It was getting more and more difficult to hold in my anger.

Had she lost her mind?

This guy had it in for her.

He held her responsible for his trouble with the law, and yet she'd gone _alone_ to meet him?

"Go ahead," she replied.

"Go ahead and what?"

"You want to yell at me for going…and for lying…for all of it. I deserve it, so go ahead."

"I'm not going to yell at you."

She moved slightly away from me, but presumably only so that she could look me in the eye. Her face was shadowed, since she now had her back to the window, but I could still see her eyes sparkling as she met my gaze.

"I remember the last time I wanted you to yell at me…and you didn't then, either."

"When you came back from Columbia."

"Uh huh. I was scared to death that your silence meant that you didn't care. Because I thought that surely if you loved me, then you could equally feel anger towards me."

"Being upset and being angry are two different things. And I like to think that I'm mature enough to regulate my response when I need to. You feel like you deserve to be treated badly because you think you've made a mistake. When did you start taking on my neurosis?"

"And when did you start exhibiting my need to psychoanalyze?" she fired back, and she sounded like she was only partly playing.

She was also partly trying to poke at me so that I'd give her the response she was looking for.

"How about we quit analyzing each other and instead you tell me what the hell that jerkoff wanted?" I posed, letting a little bit of my anger show through.

"To ruin my life," she said simply. "That's what he said. I ruined his life, and now he's going to ruin mine."

"Only if you let him," I countered. "He's a murderer. A money-launderer. An all-around crook. What could he possibly…"

"He said that he has something on you," she interrupted. "And he mentioned the lack of time limit for prosecuting a murderer."

"He's calling me a killer?"

"Or me. I'm honestly not sure who he meant. But he definitely thinks he has dirt on you. And he does have dirt on me."

"What kind of dirt?"

She settled her head back against my chest and was quiet for several minutes. I forced myself to regulate my breathing and to keep my muscles relaxed.

I owed her this.

After everything she'd dealt with for me…all the times she'd coaxed me down from the ledge…she deserved my unwavering support.

I thought I knew everything about her, but whatever it was…whatever she may have done in the past…I wasn't going to let it be an issue.

"When I said that I was scared…I don't mean of Jack specifically," she finally said, her voice barely audible.

"What is it then?"

"I'm scared of your reaction."

"How can I react if I don't know what it is?" I asked reasonably, hoping to encourage her to say more.

"That's just it though. Once it's out there…it's out there."

She picked her head up again and put both of her hands on my cheeks.

"Right now, you look at me like I'm the most special, most beautiful woman you've ever known," she said.

"That's because you are."

"What happens if you stop thinking that?" she asked, and her voice cracked on the last syllable. "I don't know if I could take it."

I could appreciate her fear, but the not knowing was absolutely killing me.

"I'll never stop thinking that. You know everything about me, and most of my past is downright ugly, and yet you love me anyway. Why won't you trust me to feel the same?"

"You're right," she said with a slow nod. "You're absolutely right. I'm sorry."

"Carolyn…"

"He has a collection of pictures," she said suddenly. "Disgusting, x-rated pictures that a private investigator took of him and me when we were having our affair twenty years ago."

"Okay," I said carefully. "And…"

"And? That's not bad enough?" she asked as she sat up in the bed. "Mike, they're just…it's…he said that he was going to send them to you. He wants you to have the image of him with me in your mind. He wants to come between us."

"And right now, you're letting him," I reminded her.

"You're…you're not…how can you not be upset?"

"Oh, I'm upset," I assured her.

And really, that was an understatement.

I couldn't wait to get my hands on Jack.

"Did you think I'd be mad at you?" I asked as she continued to stare at me. "I mean, they're all old pictures, right?"

"Yes," she said emphatically. "Although he mentioned something about trying to photoshop some of them. He wants you to think that I was with him when I went down to Asheville."

"And this is his grand plan to ruin your life? Carolyn…"

"There's more. He asked me if you'd told me everything about you. He specifically asked about your mother."

"What about her?"

"He just asked if I knew the whole sordid story, and when I said yes, he said that he was surprised I'd married you anyway."

"And then he said something about the statue of limitations on murder," I said while my mind considered the possibilities.

"Yeah, he mentioned that right as I was leaving."

"Well, that's it then."

"What's it?"

"I was questioned after she died. The cops looked at me."

"For murder? But she was sick."

"The coroner initially ruled it undetermined. Their theory was that I wanted payback, so I helped her illness along."

"But that's crazy."

"Yeah," I agreed. "Because if I was going to do it, I wouldn't have bothered being subtle, and I wouldn't have waited so long. But I didn't do it."

"But it's documented somewhere in some cop's case file."

"That's right. And Jack managed to get his hands on it. And he made you think that somehow I would think less of you because of your affair with him, and then he tossed out the possibility of murder just in case the pictures weren't enough to tie you to him" I said as I once again wrapped my arms around her.

We were both sitting up in the bed by this point, but I leaned back against the headboard and held her close.

"Mike, he showed them to me. They're just…_I_ didn't even want to look at them. I mean, it doesn't even seem real. It doesn't seem like it was _me_."

I didn't want to think too much about those pictures. I could understand why she was reluctant to tell me about them. I'd been pretty damn uncomfortable telling her about my sex life with Rhonda Hagen, and that had only been in theory rather than full color.

"So what does he want? I mean, he said he was going to mail me the pictures if you didn't do what?"

"He's going to call me on Monday. He said he wanted me to have to think about it over the weekend."

"And you thought you were going to keep this from me?" I asked, although my tone was slightly teasing. I just wanted her to see how crazy she was to think that anything she said would alter my opinion of her.

"At first, I wanted to protect you from him. And then when I saw what he had…I partly wanted to preserve your image of me, too. And then when he started talking about murder, I didn't know what to think."

"You don't think I did anything..."

"No, of course not," she said quickly. "But he thinks he has something…and true or not, it could cause some trouble for us."

"That's right. For _us_. A smart woman once told me that it's a lot tougher for any one thing to bring _both_ of us down, right?"

"I'm sorry I didn't tell you sooner," she said. "I don't know what I was thinking."

"You panicked," I said easily as I rubbed my hand over her cheek. "It happens. But sweetheart, don't ever underestimate what you mean to me, okay? I don't care if you slept with every Marine in Cuba back in the day…you're mine now and that's all that matters. How many times have you lectured me about the past being in the past?"

"And you were listening?"

"Always."

She kissed me, hesitantly at first as though she still wasn't completely sure where we stood, and so I went about the pleasurable task of erasing all of her doubts.

And as much as I hated the thought that Jack was carrying around pictures like that of _my_ Carolyn, I wasn't going to let a low-life like him come between us.

It wasn't her fault that he was a pervert.

This was almost like Rhonda all over again, only in reverse, and maybe a little worse.

Maybe if I was lucky, it would continue to play out like that.

Because Carolyn had killed Rhonda in a legitimate, justified shooting.

Hopefully, they'd give it the same label when I killed Jack.

TBC...


	12. Chapter 12

**Connie POV**

* * *

><p>I went into the empty hotel room and tossed my bag onto the dresser before carefully inspecting the entire room.<p>

Bathroom…shower stall…closet…

I had a bad case of the creeps, and even being four hours away from the city, I couldn't help but feel like someone was watching me.

In fact, people _were_ watching me.

There'd been the guy on the elevator.

He'd stepped on just as the doors were almost closed, and then he'd proceeded to stare intently at me for the three-floor trip.

I tried to pretend like I didn't notice, but he was blatant about it, and then I had to step around him to get off on my floor.

I hesitated before turning down the hall, waiting for the doors to close behind me because I didn't want him to know which direction I went to get to my room.

When I did finally head down the hall, a man came out of the room next door to mine, right as I was fiddling with the keycard.

And _he'd_ stared at me.

"Those things never want to cooperate, do they?" he'd commiserated.

His tone had been pleasant, but my heart was pounding in my chest as I continued to swipe and re-swipe the little plastic card until at last the light turned green.

I glanced back over my shoulder as I pushed open the door, but then I realized that the man was already halfway down the hall.

I was just being paranoid.

But like I said, that didn't stop me from carefully examining every inch of my room.

As much as I hated to admit it, I was really glad that Lupo was coming down for the night.

And maybe that sounds bad.

I mean, I _loved_ that I was going to get the chance to spend time with him. We just flat out didn't sleep apart anymore, not since I'd moved in with him.

But the part that I hated to admit was that I was a little bit scared of being alone.

As horribly cliché as it made me sound, I wanted him here with me because for some reason, I just felt vulnerable in this hotel room.

We'd spoken briefly on the phone a few hours ago, and he'd said that he was on his way, so I was hoping he'd be here fairly soon.

In the mean time, I decided to keep busy.

The afternoon at the precinct had gone well, so while the facts were still fresh in my mind, I opened up my laptop and made a few notes.

The DA had been willing to rush the arraignment, so that was scheduled for one o'clock tomorrow afternoon. I had to make sure that I was on my game so that I could get bail for Jeremy.

He'd opened up to me this afternoon, and he'd walked me through what little bit he could remember.

Twice, in fact.

I was going to let him walk me through it again in the morning, and hopefully after a good night's sleep, some of the blank spots might fill.

Liz had taken a couple dozen pictures of him, and she was going to go through the process again in the morning.

Call it a hunch, but something was telling me that he was going to have marks on him somewhere.

The mismatched condom brands, the stabbings immediately after sex, the rape which occurred at the time of and after death…it all led me to firmly believe that someone else was in the room.

Someone who had given him the damaged condom, and then shoved Jeremy aside once he'd finished.

The hard question was who.

Alex and Bobby liked Kenny for it, but why would Kenny sit by while Jeremy had sex with Kelly?

And since he was in love with Kelly, why would he stab her before sleeping with her?

In fact, why would he stab her at all?

In my mind, he'd be more likely to have killed Jeremy rather than Kelly.

Unless maybe she said something to him, something that infuriated him.

Something to belittle him, or to suggest that she was repulsed by the idea of being intimate with him…_that_ might have prompted him to kill her instead of the competition.

Or maybe it was someone else altogether.

I honestly had no idea, and I needed to give my mind a break from it.

Sleep had been fairly limited last night, and the stress of the death threat combined with everything going on down here…I was definitely in need of some down time.

I was also in need of food.

I kicked off my shoes and sat heavily in the chair next to the night stand.

I had a good feeling that Lupo had neglected something as basic as dinner, too, so I picked up the phone and called for room service, ordering enough for both of us.

Then I traded my slacks for a pair of gym shorts, and pulled off my blouse, leaving on the tank top that I'd been wearing underneath.

And then for some reason, I felt the sensation of being watched.

I mean _really_ felt it.

Every hair on the back of my neck was on full alert, and I had a buzzing feeling in my head.

I quickly did another pass around the tiny room, as if it was remotely possible for someone to be hiding somewhere that I wouldn't have found on the first go-round.

And then I checked the curtains, making sure the entire window was fully covered by the heavy fabric.

And when I still felt it, I walked around to the phone and picked it up, fully ready to call Bobby and Alex.

I knew they were in the room down the hall, and I wasn't above getting a second and third opinion on the safety of my room.

Just as I began to dial, there was a knock on the door.

The sound wasn't overly loud, but considering I was extremely on edge, it seemed ear-splitting and caused me to drop the phone and catch my breath.

_Get a grip, Connie_, I chastised.

I inhaled deeply to try to calm myself and then I went to the door. I glanced through the peephole and nearly cried out in relief when I saw that it was Lupo.

"You made it," I said cheerfully in an effort to mask my irrational fear.

"You checked the peephole right away," he said as he came in. "I told you not to do that. Always pass something in front of it first, and _then_ look. You have to give it five seconds, remember?"

I stared at him blankly, his admonishment completely unexpected.

"The peephole. Right," I said at last. "Sorry."

"What if I'd been him?"

And that was when my tension from moments before caught up to me.

"Then I guess this whole thing would be over, right?" I asked shrilly. "He could've shot me right through the door and then you wouldn't have to worry about keeping me safe."

"Connie…" he said, staring at me with a blend of shock and rebuke.

"No, I mean it," I continued, and I shoved him in the chest as I stepped closer to him. "It's going to happen sooner or later, right? Because I'm not a cop. I can't keep up with all of these safety precautions. I mean, there was the guy on the elevator. He creeped me out, but I still rode up with him instead of getting off. Why? I have no idea except that maybe I thought it would be rude to get off, and I'm not a rude person. And then the guy in the hall, watching me while I tried to unlock my door. If _he_ was the killer, I'd be dead for sure because I turned my back on him while I swiped the card. Hell, he could've grabbed me and pulled me into this room and…and…"

"Stop," he said, dropping his bag on the floor and pulling me into his arms. "I'm sorry I fussed at you, and right when I walked in the door. I shouldn't have done that."

"See? This is making you crazy, too. I even had the phone out, getting ready to call Bobby and Alex because I felt like someone was watching me. But I checked every inch of this twenty-by-twenty room and there's no one here but me, so you tell me…how in the world could someone be watching me?"

"You checked the room?" he asked, still holding me tightly against him.

I was wound up tight, and we both knew it. I was also embarrassed that I'd allowed myself to get so worked up, but he just continued to hold me, rocking us slightly in a soothing motion.

"Yeah…I looked all around when I first came in."

"And where are Bobby and Alex?"

"A few doors down. I thought it would be better to be near them."

"Uh huh. And you closed the curtains, and you booked the room under my name. It sounds to me like you're doing great."

"Great," I repeated. "Is that now a synonym for head case?"

He loosened his hold and then pulled back, holding gently onto my arms as he said, "Can we start this again?"

"I think that's a good idea."

So then he kissed me, and not quickly either, but rather in such a way that showed me exactly how much he'd missed me today.

"A four-hour drive for just that kiss would be worth it," he said quietly when he pulled back. He put his hand on my cheek, stroking his thumb over my skin. "So tell me about the guy on the elevator."

"He just stared at me."

"That's because you're a beautiful woman. Men stare. Did he say anything?"

"No."

"What did he look like?"

"Six-one, brown hair, brown eyes, black-frame glasses, probably two-ten…" I broke off my description when he started smiling at me. "What?"

"And you say you're not a cop. Do you know how many people actually see a crime committed and still can't describe the perpetrator? And yet you easily rattled off the basics on a guy who rode up with you in the elevator."

"Maybe," I conceded, relaxing marginally as he ran his hands down my back and then back up again, only this time beneath the cotton of my tank top.

"Definitely," he argued. "You're paying attention to your surroundings. And you're taking extra precautions. That's the best you can do right now."

"I guess you didn't have any luck with Mulder?"

"Actually, I did. And dude, it was some seriously crazy shit."

I laughed at his attempt to impersonate his hacker. I hadn't met the guy yet, but Lupo seemed to enjoy the way he talked. Or at least, he enjoyed it after the fact.

"Crazy how?" I asked, although I wasn't sure if I even wanted to know at the moment. His hands were still roaming around beneath my shirt, and then he leaned down and started kissing along the side of my neck.

And then there was another knock on the door.

In less than a second, Lupo had his gun drawn and he'd moved in front of me.

"I ordered room service," I whispered, and I'm not sure why I felt it necessary to whisper, but…whatever.

He nodded and pointed in the direction of the bathroom, so I followed his silent directive and moved around the corner while he approached the door.

"I'll just take it," I heard him say, and then I heard the door close. I went back into the main part of the room and found him standing with our dinner tray.

"You got something for me, too," he stated, looking at the two silver-domed plates on the tray. He had a half-smile on his face as though he was surprised to learn that I'd thought about him.

"I figured you wouldn't stop to eat."

"I didn't," he agreed, setting the tray down on the dresser. He quickly removed his holster and jacket and then he pulled me into his arms again and said, "Food wasn't as important as seeing you. It still isn't. I'm pretty sure we were in the middle of something…"

His hands found their way beneath my shirt again as he resumed kissing my neck, walking me backwards until we reached the bed.

"You know, Cutter suggested that I simply call you to go over what we'd found," he told me as he pulled my tank top over my head.

"You talked to Mike?"

"Yeah, he actually helped me out," he said, moving his hands to the waistband of my shorts. "And he was pretty nice about it, too."

"Good. So he said you should just call me?"

"Uh huh," he answered as he pushed my shorts down my legs. "And I told him that phones were only good for talking."

"So you basically told my boss that you were coming down here for sex," I replied wryly.

He slowly looked me up and down and then flashed me an unapologetic grin and said, "Well, yeah. I guess so."

I couldn't bring myself to be bothered by that. He looked too pleased with himself. And honestly, I was glad that the two of them seemed to have worked together without issue.

But then it finally sunk in what Lupo _wasn't_ saying.

"Wait, why did you work with him? What did you find out from Mulder?"

Although once the words were out of my mouth, I started to rethink the question.

Considering how tense I'd been before he arrived, I just wanted to take some time to relax and enjoy being with him before we had to delve back into the serious.

And I still felt the slight niggling sense of being watched, but I attributed that to residual effects from my recent paranoia.

Because with Lupo, I felt completely safe.

So we could enjoy each other and then eat and _then_ we could discuss what he'd learned from his hacker.

He'd paused in his assault on my skin with his lips, but before he could say anything, I added, "Never mind. We'll talk later."

TBC...


	13. Chapter 13

**Bobby POV**

* * *

><p>"That conversation looks awfully serious."<p>

"And look at their body language."

"You mean, her saying _let's hit the sheets_ while he's saying _I'd rather have elective surgery than sleep with you_?" Alex quipped as we slowly approached the occupied table at the back of the library.

We were both feeling pretty good this morning, after getting a good night's sleep.

I'd awakened to the comforting and arousing feel of Alex's backside nestled firmly against me. The wake-up call hadn't come through yet, so I was able to stay still and fully enjoy the feeling.

After a moment, I couldn't resist pushing hard against her. I pressed my lips to her bare shoulder while my hand idly stroked her stomach.

I felt her muscles tighten, and I knew that I'd hit a ticklish spot, but I didn't let up.

The sound of her laughter was just as sexy to me as the feel of her skin, and of course, as she laughed, she attempted to squirm away from me, so I was fully hard by the time she turned in my arms and tried to look reproachful.

"_It's not time to get up yet,"_ she'd said, the smile still on her face.

"_But _I'm_ up,"_ I countered. "_I thought you might want to help me pass some time before our wake-up call."_

"_Hmm,"_ she mused thoughtfully. _"So my choices are…sleep for another half an hour, or…"_

She broke off her words as I pulled her hips flush against mine and brought my lips down to hers. I kissed her softly, letting the moment build between us. I ran my hand over her hip and then slipped it beneath the silk of her underwear. She didn't normally wear anything to bed, but I didn't mind the added challenge of getting her out of them.

"_Yeah, I think I'll go with sleep,"_ she said when I began kissing my way down her throat as I simultaneously worked her panties down her legs.

I paused but only briefly as I looked up at her.

"_Sleep? Really?"_

She laughed again, and then put her hand on my cheek as she kissed me, hard this time, showing me just how worked up she'd gotten in such a short period of time.

"_Are you kidding me?"_ she murmured, running her hand over my chest before rolling onto her back. I moved with her, as I finally kicked her underwear out of the way, and then I settled between her legs.

"_I wasn't sure. It _has_ been seven months. You could be tired of making love with me."_

"_There's no chance of that. Not in this lifetime."_

Then she'd deftly reached her hand inside of my boxers, stroking me several times before pushing the shorts from my hips.

After that, it was merely a race to the wake-up call. I barely made it in under the buzzer, but it had been intense and extremely gratifying, and it had gotten our day started off right.

We'd met up with the others for breakfast at nine-thirty, three and a half hours before Jeremy's scheduled arraignment.

"_If you can bring me something good, I may be able to convince the DA to hold off on the arraignment altogether,"_ Connie told us. "_He won't want to rush ahead with charges that may be premature."_

"May_ be premature?"_ Liz had questioned. _"They arrested him by virtue of being in the same room with the victim."_

"_And his prints were on the weapon,"_ Ross reminded her.

"_But what's his motive?"_ Lupo argued.

"_We're light on motive,"_ I agreed.

"_Except that Kelly's friend says that Kelly was thinking long-term, even though Jeremy says they were casual,"_ Alex stated.

"_And if every man started knocking off the woman in his life because she wanted to get more serious…"_ Lupo said before trailing off when Connie nudged his arm off the table. _"What? I'm just saying…"_

"_He has a point,"_ I said_. "It's not really grounds for murder."_

Ross sat back and sighed, rubbing his hand over his face, and I watched as Liz settled her hand on his back.

"_How are you two holding up?"_ I asked them.

"_I took two pills to help me sleep last night, and then I felt like a hypocrite,"_ Ross admitted.

"_Danny, a sleep aid is not the same thing as ecstasy,"_ Liz said quietly.

"_I know. I just feel like…I don't know him at all."_

"_Well, he knows you,"_ Alex told him. _"He wants to be like you."_

"_Is that what he told you?"_

"_No, but that's what we've learned. He hasn't said anything to you about wanting to be a cop?"_

"_Not since he was twelve."_

"_He said something to me," _Liz interjected.

"_When?"_

"_A month or so ago. We text from time to time,"_ she answered. _"He asked me if you made a good living. I thought that he was hinting that he needed money, so I offered to send him some…"_

"_You sent him money?"_ Ross interrupted. I glanced at Alex, wondering if maybe we should leave them alone, but then Liz looked at me and shook her head slightly.

"_I didn't because he wasn't asking, although I have in the past,"_ she told him in that tone of hers that strongly discourages argument. _"He was asking because he told me that he wants to join the NYPD. After college, of course."_

"_You never told me that."_

"_Because it's not my place to tell you. It's his. I'm only saying it now because, well…I thought you should know. He's a good kid, Danny, with a solid plan for his future." _

"_Which is something I can convey to the prosecutor when I ask him to hold off on the charges,"_ Connie said. _"I think if we can find one more piece that doesn't quite fit as well as the BPD might like, then he'll be willing to wait. At least until a more thorough investigation can be completed_."

So that was our mission this morning.

Liz and Ross were going back to the precinct, along with Connie, where they would re-photograph and re-interview Jeremy.

Lupo was headed back to New York to work on Connie's stalker case. I'd asked him for an update, but he'd been vague, stating that we had our hands full as it was.

And Alex and I were going to talk to Jeremy's friends and acquaintances again in an effort to smoke out any inconsistencies.

Our first stop, which had been Kenny's dorm room, had netted us a brief yet telling visit with Kenny's roommate.

"I'm not trying to stress over him, man," Jordan told us. We'd obviously gotten him out of bed, and he looked hung over.

"We're not asking you to stress over him," Alex replied. She rolled her eyes at me when Jordan began a lengthy session of scratching himself. "We just want to know where he is."

"I told you yesterday where he hangs," he retorted. "Do I need to spell it out? Lie-_berry_, man."

I ducked my head in an effort to hide my smile, while Alex just gave him a blank stare and shook her head.

"You might want to think about spending some quality time there, too, Jordan. So what did you do last night?"

"Who me? I was gettin' reckless."

"Which means what, exactly?"

"A little of this and a little of that."

"Would this and that be E and special K?" she asked him.

"What are you, the drug police?"

"That's right, Jordan," she said smartly, taking a step closer to him. "We're the police, so start talking before we decide that you need to be hauled downtown."

I looked at her questioningly because we weren't cops here and we weren't taking anyone anywhere, but she was on a roll, so I just let her go at it.

And it was working, because now he seemed to be taking us a little more seriously.

"Relax," he said quickly. "I smoked some weed, okay? But that's it. I don't do that other stuff."

"Who does?"

"Come on, he asked me this same stuff yesterday," he said, nodding at me. "I don't know."

"Have you ever seen Kelly Farrar with Kenny?"

"Kelly and Kenny?" he repeated, looking extremely amused. "No way. She is way too fine for that tool."

"Says you, or says her?"

"Says everyone. And he knows it, too. He knows it's never gonna happen. Well, I mean…"

He trailed off when he realized that it truly was never going to happen now that someone had killed Kelly, and he had the good manners to look remorseful.

"Look, Kelly was a sweet girl. I don't know why anyone would want to do that. But if you're looking at Kenny, you're off the mark. I mean, he was into her…_really_ into her, so why would he hurt her?"

"You tell me."

"He wouldn't. I can't vouch for him being in the room Friday night, but that's no different than half the other nights of the year. We're not friends. We just got stuck living together."

"Okay. Thanks, Jordan. And lay off that pot. It kills your brain cells," Alex told him as we turned to leave.

"You're not going to take me in?"

"For what?"

"I don't know, but I'm working on one hell of a pilf fantasy here, so I thought maybe you could help me out," he said, and then he looked at me and added, "You're feeling me, right?"

"Sleep it off, Jordan," I told him, and then I followed Alex out of the room.

"That was helpful," she said sardonically as we left the dormitory. Then she glanced up at me and asked, "Pilf?"

"I'm pretty sure it means _police I'd like to_…"

"Got it," she interrupted. Then she shook her head and said, "These college kids have sex on the brain, don't they? Maybe if they spent a little more time studying and a little less time hooking up, they might actually learn that the word _library_ has two R's in it instead of one."

By the time we found Kenny in the library, I had Alex laughing with my descriptive narrative about my own personal pilf fantasy.

"Hold that thought," she told me as we approached our intended target.

Kenny was there, sitting at the end of the table, and there was a girl next to him who had her back to us.

But even though we couldn't see her face, her interest was flagrant. She had positioned herself so that her chest was pushed against his arm, and she kept reaching up to touch his cheek or to run her hand through his hair.

Kenny, on the other hand, was casting her detached glances and inching slightly away from her.

Whatever the girl was saying to him, he kept responding in short, harsh sentences.

Until he caught a glimpse of us.

Then he sat back in his chair and looked at us challengingly.

"What do you want now?"

"I thought maybe you'd had time to reconsider our request of providing us with your DNA," Alex said as she skirted the table.

I positioned myself between Kenny and the exit in an effort to avoid a repeat of yesterday.

"Why would I do that?" he asked, but I noticed that Alex had already shifted her attention to Kenny's table companion.

"Cierra," she said in surprise. "I didn't realize that you and Kenny knew each other."

"Cierra…as in Kelly's roommate?" I asked as I moved subtly to the left so that I could see her face.

She turned and looked me over in a predatory manner before returning her attention back to Alex.

"We live on the same hall. Of course I know him."

"I mean, know him in the sense that you're throwing yourself at him," Alex corrected. "You know, when I suggested that you get over your obsession with older men, I didn't really mean that you had to start hitting on freshmen."

"Hey, I'm not trying to be burned by no has-been," Kenny retorted, having obviously taken offense at the freshman remark. Although, I don't know why, considering he _was_ one, but still…

Alex brushed off the has-been comment and instead faced Cierra as she stood up from the table.

"Please," the girl said stiffly. "As if. I was just getting some help studying for a test."

"Philosophy?" I asked. "I've got one for you today. _Most people fancy themselves innocent of those crimes of which they cannot be convicted."_

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" Cierra asked.

"What does it mean? Isn't it obvious?"

"Don't get him started," Kenny warned her as he glared at me. "What do you two really want? Are you just here to harass me?"

"Yeah, well…we didn't have anything else to do," Alex said as she pulled out a chair. She sat down at the far end of the table and then looked at Cierra and said in a firm voice, "Sit."

The girl immediately returned to her chair and then began studiously staring at the table.

I widened my stance and crossed my arms over my chest as I eyeballed Kenny.

Something was going on here, but I couldn't put my finger on exactly what it was.

Alex was right there with me, though, because I noticed that she kept bouncing her focus from Cierra to Kenny and then back again, waiting to see which one of them was going to start talking first.

Apparently, neither of them, so I decided to throw them a curve ball just to see if they'd swing.

"So, how did it work?" I asked at last. "Did you plan it together?"

"Plan what together?" Kenny replied roughly.

"Kelly's murder."

TBC...


	14. Chapter 14

**Ross POV**

* * *

><p>"She just went back to Albany?"<p>

"Without a word," I confirmed in answer to Bernard's question.

There were ten of us sitting around a table in Steve-O's, and it felt good to be back to some sense of normalcy.

Although that thought brought about an internal chuckle.

Me, sitting in a bar with my wife, seven of my detectives, and an ADA was not anywhere near normal. Or at least it wasn't until a few months ago.

It was funny how quickly I'd assimilated to my new life.

And my ex-wife's behavior made me all that much happier that I _did_ have a new life instead of still being tied to my old one.

"Well, she did send you that nice text," Liz reminded me with her usual sarcasm.

"Oh, I think we need to hear about that," Alex said.

"Well, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't use the word nice," I replied with a droll grin. "In fact, there were a couple of words that I'm not going to repeat in mixed company."

"I thought you set her straight, Liz," Bobby commented.

"Some people just aren't equipped to handle a crisis," Liz answered. "It was best for everyone involved that she went back home."

"Yeah, everyone except for Aaron," Connie remarked.

I was a little surprised that she even remembered my other son's name, but the fact that she did and that she was concerned about him made me feel good.

I was concerned about him, too, which was why he was coming to New York as soon as he graduated. He only had five weeks left, and I hoped that in that time, we'd be able to sort out Jeremy's mess.

I filled the others in on my plans for Aaron, and then the conversation shifted to Carolyn's latest plight.

She and Logan had been really quiet at first, and then finally, after several long meaningful looks between the two of them, she'd come clean about what was going on with her.

"That's what you were going to keep from Mike?" Alex asked her abruptly.

"Exactly. That's what I said," Logan said with a nod. He'd put his arm around her and hugged her to him briefly and then added, "I mean, I can appreciate the thought, but…no way, sweetheart."

The chatter had moved on to something else for a short period of time, giving her a chance to gather her emotions after such a personal confession, but then we switched back to it, only this time she had her defenses in place.

That was one thing I loved about this group. Everyone watched out for each other, emotionally as well as physically.

"So we're all getting copies of those pictures, right?" Lupo teased her. I held my breath for a moment, waiting to see if his joke was too much for her, but she smiled and ducked her head.

"No one is seeing those pictures. And I mean _no one_," she said firmly.

"Oh, I'm sure they're going to be a vital part of the investigation though, right?" Bernard added.

"No, they aren't," she replied. "And you're not even on this investigation anyway."

"I can offer my assistance," he suggested.

"I think you have your hands full as it is," Logan told him pointedly. I did notice that Bernard was sitting awfully close to Hayes, and then I remembered that whole conversation during the poker game Friday night.

Were they dating now?

Or had he just, as Logan so bluntly put it, given her a ride?

I glanced at Liz and tried to get her attention, but she was having too much fun teasing with the others.

And honestly, it didn't matter. They both looked happy, so I wasn't going to knock it.

In fact, everyone seemed fairly content tonight. I loved that the mood at the table was light-hearted. I was in desperate need of it after the weekend.

Although, it had turned out better than I'd hoped.

The Gorens had learned about a whole love-quadrilateral going on between Kenny, Kelly, Jeremy, and Cierra, only Jeremy didn't know anything about it.

Apparently, Cierra wanted him and Kenny wanted Kelly, so the two of them had promised to work together to break up Jeremy and Kelly.

Of course, they didn't admit to killing her, but neither had an alibi for Friday night because no one could confirm seeing Kenny at the library and Cierra's supposed date wouldn't vouch for her.

So then Connie had eloquently reminded the DA that a wiped-clean window, bruising on Jeremy's shoulder blades, and two additional potential suspects with motive had turned his slam-dunk case into a risky one, at best.

"_I can see the faces of the jury now,"_ she'd argued. "_I'll put Jeremy on the stand…the attractive son of the NYPD's Chief of Detectives…a Government major who wants to follow in his father's footsteps…a solid 3.8 GPA…"_

"_And a drug user,"_ the DA pointed out.

"_Along with everyone else in that school,"_ she reminded him. _"I don't think that's going to score you any points, especially when I mention how Kenny Cossman became infuriated at the thought of the victim having sex with someone other than him. He was in love with her. Obsessed with her. And twenty other students will testify that she wouldn't give him the time of day, so where does that leave him? With no alibi and a clear motive."_

"_Clear motive? If he loved her, why would he kill her?"_

"_Do you want me to start rattling off the statistics about obsessed men who kill the object of their affection?"_ she'd asked, and I noticed that her voice sounded a little shaky as she brought up that point.

I had to wonder how much she was thinking about her own stalker, and I appreciated her even more for helping me out at a time when she was in the middle of her own nightmare.

"_No, Counselor,"_ the DA replied resignedly.

"_And don't get me started on Cierra Bingham,"_ she continued. "_She lied to the investigators about her whereabouts, she was in love with the victim's boyfriend…"_

"_You've made your point,"_ he interrupted. _"The police have more work to do on this case before we're going anywhere near a court room."_

"_Thank you,"_ she said victoriously. _"Call over to the BPD and let them know that the suspect is to be released."_

"_He needs to stay in the jurisdiction,"_ he advised.

"_Actually, he's going to be in New York for the next two weeks. He'll be back in Baltimore to take his exams, but then he's going to spend the summer with his father"_ she told him firmly. _"If you need him for additional questioning, I'll personally guarantee his availability."_

She handed him her business card and then shook his hand.

"_It's been a pleasure,"_ she told him and then she turned and led the way out of his office.

"_I can't thank you enough,"_ I told her as together we headed back to the precinct where everyone else was waiting. _"And I owe you, so…whatever you need, okay? I'll put a police detail on you twenty-four-seven until your stalker is caught, if that's what you want."_

"_I already have that,"_ she'd replied with a wry smile. _"But thanks anyway."_

And she was right about that. Lupo hadn't relaxed his vigilance in the hour that we'd been in Steve-O's. He was constantly checking the room, watching the door, and analyzing anyone who ventured too near our table.

"Tomorrow, you and Eames are going full bore on this thing, okay?" I said to him suddenly, knowing that he would know right away what I was talking about. "It's a Major Case. Do what you need to do."

"Thank you, sir."

"Do you have any leads?"

"Other than that it came from the District Attorney's office building? Not really," he admitted. "Connie gave me a couple of names that I'm going to check out. And now that you're going to authorize Eames to work it with me during regular business hours, we'll put on the full court press at her office tomorrow, during the day when everyone is there."

"Speaking of Eames," I said, turning to look at Hayes and Bernard. "How much longer is he going to be in Major Case? Are you two anywhere near wrapping up the ADA murders?"

"We're going to re-interview the mistress in the morning," Bernard answered. "She has an alibi, but we both feel pretty strongly about the fact that she's involved somehow."

"Murder for hire?" I posed.

"Maybe," Hayes agreed. "Although no money was exchanged. Or at least not as far as we can tell."

"She doesn't seem the type to deal in cash," Bernard added pointedly.

"She traded sex for two murders?" Liz asked in surprise. "No one's that good."

"Thank you, Liz," I said sarcastically, and everyone started laughing again.

"Oh, I mean no one except you," she added quickly.

That brought about a myriad of protests, and I was desperate to change the subject.

It didn't bother Liz to talk about stuff like that, but I wasn't quite there yet.

In fact, just remembering that two nights ago she'd been telling the women at the table about our sex life…I could feel my face getting hot just thinking about it.

"Anyway," Bernard said loudly in attempt to get the conversation back on track. "The mistress regularly called both men."

"Half a dozen times daily, but after their deaths…" Hayes added.

"No calls," Bernard continued.

"Even though the names were initially withheld."

"So we're thinking that she didn't call because…"

"She already knew they were dead," Hayes finished.

I found myself staring blankly at them during their tag-team delivery, and when they finished, silence fell over the table.

"Are you having flashbacks, Chief?" Alex asked after a moment. I didn't even have to look at her to know that she was smirking.

"What?" Hayes asked innocently.

"You sound just like them," Logan told her in an exaggerated whisper, waggling his finger back and forth between Alex and Bobby.

"Not just them," Lupo corrected. "You guys, too," he said to Logan and Carolyn.

"It's called being partners," Bernard said. "When you spend a lot of time working together…"

"Give it up, Detective," I said, shaking my head. "I threw the rule book out the window months ago."

"You should've done it years ago," Liz reminded me.

"Yes, honey. I know," I replied.

There were lots of things I should've done years ago, but I had to settle for making sure that I got it right now.

I was going to be more active in Jeremy's life and help him get himself back on course.

We'd had a good talk in the car on the way up from Baltimore.

_"What would you think about me going to NYU?"_ he'd asked me.

It didn't surprise me that he didn't want to stay at Johns Hopkins.

The emotional impact of his girlfriend being murdered still hadn't fully hit him, but he was smart enough to recognize that college life was never going to be the same.

"_I think that would be great,"_ I told him.

"_I could live on campus, but I'd still get to see you guys. A lot more than before, anyway. If that's okay."_

"_It's a wonderful idea_," Liz told him.

"_Are you sure? Because you know, I wanted to go there to begin with, but Mom said that it wouldn't be a good idea because…well, she said that…"_

"_Whatever she said,"_ I interrupted. "_She's wrong."_

"_Uh huh_," Liz agreed._ "So for the next two weeks, you're going to study your ass off so that you can ace all of your finals. Then I'm sure that NYU will approve the transfer."_

"_But Jeremy," _I began._ "No drugs. You have to be done with that."_

"_Trust me, Dad. I'm done," _he promised.

"_And no drinking until you're twenty-one," _Liz added firmly.

"_And here I thought you were the hard-ass," _Jeremy said teasingly to me as he reached up from the backseat and wrapped his arm around Liz.

"_And no cursing," _she added, although she was laughing by that point.

I loved how well the two of them got along, and it was amazing to me that I'd been largely unaware of it.

I'd been unaware of entirely too much until now.

All of that was going to change.

TBC...


	15. Chapter 15

**Alex POV**

* * *

><p>"Give it your best shot, Detective."<p>

I glanced down at Bobby where he was kneeling next to the dead body.

Liz, having extended her challenge, got up from where she'd been previously crouched down next to him and pulled off her gloves.

Bobby looked at the victim for another moment and then stood up.

"You've got me on this one, Doc," he replied.

I nodded my agreement as I continued to look at the body.

I knew what Bobby was thinking.

It wasn't that a cause of death was hard to determine, but rather _which injury_ was the cause of death that made it difficult.

It looked like the young woman had been beaten, strangled, shot, and stabbed.

"Oh, come on," Liz teased as she jotted a few notes onto the form attached to her clipboard. "Use some of that Goren magic."

I was glad to see her in such a good mood tonight. Surely the past several days hadn't been easy on her or Ross, but she was holding up nicely.

It was just before midnight on Tuesday night. Bobby and I had gotten the call about an hour ago.

"_Are you up for it?"_ Ross had asked when I answered the phone.

"_Of course,"_ I replied easily.

"_Are you sure? I can give it to someone else. I mean, you're up next, but if your shoulder's bothering you, or if you two need to get caught up on your sleep…"_

"_Chief, we're good,"_ I insisted.

And really, we were.

Despite our busy weekend in Baltimore, Monday and Tuesday had been light days at work, and Monday night we'd managed to get nearly ten hours of sleep.

"_Don't start showing us preferential treatment now,"_ I added jokingly. "_I'm not sure I'd know how to handle it."_

"_You think I don't show you guys favoritism, Mrs. Goren?"_ he retorted.

It sounded very strange to hear him call me that, especially considering it had taken him years to call Bobby by his last name, or by any name at all for that matter.

But Ross was a different man now, on many levels.

I laughed at his comeback, knowing full well that he'd taken a risk by bringing us back as partners.

A good, calculated risk, but a risk nonetheless.

I also knew that we _were_ his favorites. Long gone were the days of being on his list. All I had to do was say the word and he'd call the next pair of detectives in the rotation.

But I was ready for a new case, and so was Bobby.

"_Touché. What've you got?"_

Which was how Bobby and I had ended up here, in front of the Greek Consulate. The victim had been stashed in the flowering bushes in front of the building.

"You want magic?" Bobby asked Liz. "Okay. I'm going to go with poison."

"Poison?" she repeated, barking out a laugh. "With so many other available options?"

Bobby just smiled at her and then looked at me as he pulled off his gloves.

"No witnesses," I said in answer to his unasked questions. I'd spoken with the officers on scene while he'd been checking out the body. "No purse or ID. An employee of the salon next door was walking past at ten-thirty and noticed the body."

"Is the employee still around?" he asked me.

"The first officer on scene felt sorry for her and sent her home after taking her statement, but I've got her information."

He nodded thoughtfully and looked over the surrounding area.

"We need to canvass those apartments across the street. Ten-thirty…people should've heard a scream…a shot…something."

"Unless she wasn't shot here. This could just be the dump site," I suggested.

"Listen to your partner, Detective," Liz spoke up. She was standing back as her assistants loaded the body onto a gurney. "I don't think it happened here. I'll confirm that for you as soon as I can."

"It was just a thought," I said. "I mean, there's a lot of blood."

"I'm not saying she didn't die here," Liz amended. "Only that the injuries were inflicted elsewhere. There's blood, but not enough for wounds like this."

"So the killer beat her, strangled her, stabbed her…" Bobby began.

"Then shot her and put her in the back of his car and dropped her in front of the Greek Consulate," I finished. "A statement?"

"She doesn't look Mediterranean," Bobby remarked.

"No, she doesn't," I agreed. "So is the location a coincidence? Or does it hold meaning for the killer?"

"I wonder how many of these places have security cameras? It had to take at least a minute to pull her out of the car and hide her in the bushes. That's pretty risky."

"Which means that this place _is_ important for some reason," I said with a nod. "Otherwise why risk it?"

"Uh huh."

"Okay, kids," Liz said. "You do your thing and I'll go do mine. I'll call you when I'm done."

But we didn't wait for her to call.

After an hour of knocking on doors, waking up people who insisted on ignorance of the crime committed practically on their doorstep, we put a hold on the canvass and instead went to the morgue.

We were hoping that Liz would have at least an ID, if not maybe some other interesting evidence that would provide us with a lead.

By this time, it was about one-thirty in the morning, so the morgue was eerily quiet as we went down the hall.

"I wonder how Liz feels, working late at night like this," I commented, keeping my voice at a low whisper. Not that I thought anyone was listening, but because talking loudly would just feel wrong in this setting.

"She certainly seems to be a lot better. Or at least over the hump."

"It's tough when you feel afraid in your own environment," I commented. "When an attack happens where you work, or at home…"

"How long did it take you?" he asked, stopping my progress with a gentle hand on my shoulder.

I turned to look at him, surprised that he'd brought up this long-past incident, but understanding that it was something we'd never really discussed. Not like this, anyway.

"To stop feeling afraid in my own home?" I clarified. "Um…I think it was different with me. I never really felt afraid. I was just…angry. Mostly at myself for letting it happen."

"And at me," he said. "Right?"

"I was never mad at you," I said firmly. Then I smiled and added, "I mean, not because of that. There have been some times when you've made me plenty mad…"

He ran his hand up and down my arm, supposedly to soothe me, but I think it was actually more for him. I knew he still felt guilt about what had happened, but I'd never blamed him.

"You know, I talked to my shrink about you," I continued. "Back then, after the kidnapping."

"You did?" he asked carefully.

"Uh huh."

"What did you say?"

"I told her that I wasn't getting better by myself. She suggested that I spend some time with my family, but all I wanted to do was go back to work. To be with you."

"You told her that? What if she'd written it in her report?"

"I didn't say that it was because I was in love with you," I said with a smile. "Just that being at work, with you, is what would make me feel normal again."

"But you were," he stated, and now he was smiling, too.

"In love with you? Oh, yeah. You know that."

"Yeah, but I never get tired of hearing it."

He glanced in both directions and then gave me a quick kiss before stepping back and then the two of us continued on towards Liz's autopsy suite.

"I knew you wouldn't wait for me to call," Liz said as we went through the doors.

She was bent over the body on her table and she didn't even glance up, which told me that she was comfortable with the new security system the OCME chief had installed.

"We were hoping you might give us something better to go on," Bobby admitted.

"No, you just wanted to see if you were right," she countered as she stood back from the table.

"Well?"

She looked at me and rolled her eyes.

"How do you live with him?"

"Are you kidding me?" I asked. "He was right about the poisoning?"

"Antifreeze," she stated as she pulled off her gloves. "Everything else was overkill."

I stared at her for a moment longer and then turned to look at Bobby and raised an eyebrow at him.

"She smelled…sweet," he said with a shrug. "It was a guess."

"Well, it was a good one," Liz remarked. "So, there you go. COD is poisoning. Based on the amount that's metabolized, I'd say that she ingested it approximately twelve hours ago."

"And the other injuries?"

"The bruises, including the ones on her neck from the attempted strangulation, range in age from three to six hours prior to death. The stab wounds are more like an hour before death. And the gunshot was nearly peri-mortem."

"Maybe she wasn't dying fast enough for our killer," I mused.

"So he has a safe place," Bobby said quietly. "Some place where he was able to take the victim, torture her, and then finally kill her before dumping her body. Do we have an ID?"

"I thought you'd never ask. Vanessa Sullivan, age twenty-seven."

"She's got a sheet?"

"She's an honorably discharged veteran. According to the database, she was in the Army until three months ago."

We took Liz's report and went to 1PP.

This case had an unnerving feel to it, especially since Bobby had just brought up the Jo Gage incident.

The similarities were tough to ignore.

"We need to run the MO through the system," I said as I sat down at my desk.

"Uh huh," Bobby agreed. "But I don't think you're going to find anything."

"It was too good to be a first, don't you think?"

"Yeah, but…"

"Mike, I'm not doing it," I heard Carolyn say, and I looked up in surprise to see her and Mike walking into the squad room. She was in front, with a full head of steam, and he was strolling slowly behind her.

He rolled his eyes behind her back and then caught sight of us and so he changed his direction.

"Fancy meeting you two here," he commented casually as he sat on the edge of my desk. "New case?"

"Nobody ever kills in the daylight," I replied. "So what are you guys working on? Something new with the Payne case?"

Mike and Carolyn had gotten a call _last_ night at midnight that had taken them out to Ralph Demarco Park. A floater had washed ashore and was discovered by a seasoned hooker and her mortified john.

"Nah, we're trying to get some work done on this Jack thing," he answered.

"What's going on with that?" Bobby asked as he came around to stand behind me. Then he nodded towards Carolyn, who was now on the phone and said, "And why is she mad at you?"

"She's not mad," he said, turning to look at her as he said the words. He dropped his voice, even though we were mostly alone in the room and added, "She's just…having trouble dealing with this. She's so…private, and this guy…he's throwing everything but the kitchen sink at her."

"What's his game?" I asked. "I mean, he was supposed to call yesterday, right?"

"He knows her. He's messing with her mind. He's keeping her on pins and needles, waiting to see what he's going to do next. And in the mean time, he keeps texting her and sending pictures."

"Of them?" Bobby questioned.

"Uh huh," he said with a slow nod, bringing his eyes back around to ours. "And you know, I might seem calm on the outside, but I'm telling you, when I get my hands on this guy…"

"So what is it that you want her to do?" I asked.

"I told her to make it an official case. To call in the dogs. He's on probation and he's harassing a cop. Ross would approve a statewide BOLO in a second. Pick him up, throw him in prison, end of story."

His idea made sense, but I could also understand why Carolyn didn't want to do it.

"You can't blame her," Bobby said, his words echoing my thoughts.

"No," he agreed. "I didn't actually think that she would. I just wanted her to know that it was okay with me if she did it. Honestly, I think she's more worried about me in all of this than her."

"Of course she is," I told him as I got up from my chair. "Give us a minute."

I crossed the room to Carolyn's desk just as she was hanging up her phone.

"Sorry about that," she said immediately.

"Don't be sorry to me."

She looked at me inquisitively, and I added, "It wasn't my head you were biting off."

She glanced over at Mike and then closed her eyes and let out a sigh.

"I know. I keep doing that," she admitted. Then she looked at me and said quietly, "I'm really losing it, Alex. I thought I could do this, but he's relentless and I just…I don't know. I've never felt so powerless."

"You're afraid of what's going to come out. But how bad can it be? Other than the pictures, I mean."

"He's threatening to open a murder investigation into Mike's mother. And he keeps bringing up his wife's murder, too."

"What do either of them have to do with it?"

"That's just it. I don't know. He sends me cryptic text messages and then he attaches those pictures…I'm not sleeping or eating or…being a good wife. I'm telling you, I'm about five seconds away from a breakdown."

"We need to regroup," I told her firmly. "Give me your phone."

"What? No!"

I took a step closer to her and flashed her my most intimidating look, and to my surprise, she gave me her phone. She really _was_ losing it, because the Carolyn I knew would've gone toe to toe with me in a second.

I stood there with the phone in my outstretched hand and watched as she dropped her eyes, waiting to see what I was going to do next.

And honestly, I wasn't sure.

"Let's bring him in," I said at last.

"Jack? Bring him in here?"

"It shouldn't be hard to violate him," I said, picking up steam with my idea. "We'll bring him in and Bobby and I take a run at him. We'll see what we can get from him while he's on his heels."

"And then what?"

"It'll give you something to work on. We need to know what he thinks he has over you and Mike, and what he ultimately wants from you. So we'll get in his face and see how he likes it. And in the mean time, you and Mike start looking over his wife's murder case. Maybe you'll be able to find why it's important. And go over Mike's mom's file again, too. He said they opened one up on her, right?"

"Yeah. They interviewed him and everything, but it was eventually ruled a natural death."

"Okay. Well, Jack must have started with that file, too, so something in there is ambiguous and he's running with it."

She nodded and looked at me hopefully.

"You think it'll work?"

"It's better than nothing, right? But you need to get your head out of your ass," I said firmly, in the nicest way possible. "You're pushing away your allies and you've blinded yourself to the facts. That's not how we do things."

"Is that the Alex version of a pep talk?"

"No, it's Bobby's version. If you want mine, it involves an ass-kicking, so it's your choice."

She gave me a slow smile and got up from her chair.

"I knew there was a reason why I like him better," she said. "Okay, message received. Now give me back my damn phone."

I held it back out to her and flashed her a grin.

"That's better. Now we're going to put a trace on your phone and then you're going to call him so that we can get a handle on where he is. He won't expect it, because he thinks you're too scared to use your police resources."

"What should I say to him?"

I could think of quite a few things that I'd like to say to him, but I hesitated and then she said exactly what I was hoping for.

"Never mind. I know what I'm going to say. Let's get the trace so I can make the call."

TBC...


	16. Chapter 16

**Lupo POV**

* * *

><p>"So, you're never gonna believe this."<p>

I was only halfway listening because Eames had been chattering on for almost the entire drive and honestly, I missed Bernard's quiet brooding.

Not that he was a downer or anything, but at least he knew when to give it a rest.

Eames knew no such thing.

And I liked him. I mean, he was a funny guy and as partners went, I'd definitely had worse.

But this thing with Connie had me in a serious mood and a little silence would've been nice.

"Lupo?"

"What?" I asked with barely masked annoyance.

"Did you hear what I said?"

"No. Look, Eames, if you could maybe just dial it back…"

"Alicia's pregnant," he said loudly, interrupting my plea for quiet. "I wasn't supposed to tell anyone yet, but I just couldn't wait. I mean, how cool is this going to be? And she's only a month behind Kendra, so they'll kind of be able to go through it together, and…"

And I hate to say it, but I briefly tuned him out.

I mean, he was so excited, and I was happy for him because like I said, he's a nice guy.

But I was still trying to wrap my head around the email that Connie had received this morning.

_**I saw you in Baltimore.**_

That was it.

Short and to the point.

_Very_ to the point.

She'd said at the time that she felt like she was being watched, but she'd searched the room and we'd kept the curtains closed.

Which meant that the guy had seen her somewhere other than at the hotel, which was where she'd been when she had the feeling.

Had he seen her at the police station?

Had he _really_ followed her all the way from New York?

Or was he bluffing?

But then how could he have known where she'd been?

"Lupo," Eames said, and I realized belatedly that he'd already said my name a few times in the past several seconds. "Wasn't that the exit?"

"Shit," I muttered, cutting across three lanes of traffic to get to the authorized-vehicle-only access road that would take me to the other side of the highway.

I executed a sharp U-turn and then cut across three more lanes to take the exit.

"I'm driving when we go back to the city," he stated, looking at me like I was certifiable.

And maybe I was.

Maybe this whole stalking thing had sent me around the bend.

"Where does this hacker guy live anyway?" he continued as he looked out the window.

"It's not much further," I replied vaguely.

Mercifully, he was quiet as I drove the last few miles and then parked outside of Mulder's home. I shut off the car and reached in the backseat and picked up Connie's laptop and then I grabbed the door handle.

"Stay here," I instructed Eames.

"What? I can't come in?"

"He doesn't like strangers."

"Lupo…"

"Just give me twenty minutes, okay?"

"Yeah, okay," he agreed reluctantly.

It wasn't that I was trying to shut him out, but Mulder didn't care much for strangers. It had freaked him out when I brought Bernard with me, but he was my regular partner, so it was likely he'd be with me on future visits.

Eames would be going back to his precinct soon, so there was no need to traumatize Mulder for one quick visit.

I closed the door, and then because I felt guilty about my earlier behavior, I opened it back up and leaned in and said, "That's great news about the baby. I'm happy for you guys."

He looked at me dubiously and then I felt even worse.

"Really," I said sincerely. "I'm just distracted, but…I think it's great."

He seemed to accept my belated well-wishes, so I closed the door and went up the walk.

His mother opened the door before I could even ring the bell.

"You're back," she said blandly.

"Yes, ma'am. Is he…"

"You're not doing something illegal, are you?"

"No, ma'am. I'm a cop."

"Uh huh. Does that mean you can't break the law?"

"No, but…no. Your son's just really good at what he does and he's been helping me out with an investigation."

"A legitimate investigation? Or are you trying to hack a bank in Geneva?"

"It's legit. I promise," I answered, although I was curious as to her assumption.

Had Mulder done something like that before?

Probably, but I honestly didn't care.

The guy was good, and I needed answers.

The woman continued to look me over and then she took a long drink of what I guessed to be a Bloody Mary, even though it was only nine o'clock in the morning.

"What kind of case?" she asked me after she finished off her drink.

"Stalking," I replied, wondering how long I was going to have to tolerate the bulldog. I tried to glimpse around her sizeable bulk that filled the doorway, but it was impossible.

"Somebody's stalking you?"

"No, ma'am. I'm a cop," I reminded her. "I'm investigating a stalking case."

"You've been out here to see my boy twice in less than a week. That's diligence."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Who's that out in the car?"

"My partner."

"He's not the same one who came with you last month."

"This is a temporary partner."

"Temporary? What's the matter with you? Why can't you keep a partner?"

"There's nothing wrong with me. Our boss just switched us around for one case."

"Uh huh," she said suspiciously. "Well, don't make him wait in the car like no damn dog. Call him inside."

I didn't point out that she'd just instructed me to _call him inside_…much like a dog. But if summoning him to the house was going to be my ticket to Mulder, then I'd do it.

So I stepped off the front porch and waved to Eames.

He got out of the car and trotted up the front walk.

"What's up?" he asked me.

"You okay with him leaving you in the car like that?" the woman yelled out to him.

Eames glanced at me nervously, not sure how to answer the question.

"Uh…yeah. Yes. Yes, ma'am."

"Lupo!" I heard Mulder shout exuberantly as he pushed his way around his mother.

_Thank the Lord. _

"Why didn't you let him in?" he asked his mother, and then he looked skeptically at Eames. "And who's this?"

"It's your friend's _temporary_ partner. He's going to keep me company while you two do your illegal business."

"It's not illegal, Mom. He's a cop."

"So he says."

I looked to Eames for help, and to my surprise, he wrapped his arm around Mulder's mother and walked with her inside of the house.

"He's actually a really good cop," he assured her as they walked away. "They don't come any better than Lupo. And he speaks very highly of your son. Did he learn about computers from you?"

"Jeez, man, shit. I'm sorry about that," Mulder said as he led the way to the basement. "Sometimes she gets a bug up her ass."

"She thought you were helping me hack a bank in Geneva."

Mulder froze mid-step and turned back to look at me.

"I don't want to know," I said quickly.

"It's not what you think."

"Mulder, really. Stop talking."

Once downstairs, I got out Connie's laptop and handed it off to him.

"So she got another email," I explained. "I need you to see if it originated from the same location."

Because over the past two days, Eames and I had interviewed literally hundreds of employees of the District Attorney's office and so far we had zilch.

My hope was that we'd be able to better pinpoint the origination location, like maybe if the second email came from the same IP.

Or if it didn't, then it would have to be someone who had roaming access in the building.

Maybe.

I don't know.

I was grasping.

But I also wanted him to look for any kind of Trojan horse that might have been installed on her laptop. I knew that she'd used it to type up her notes about Jeremy's case.

It was a stretch, but if there was some kind of spyware on there, then that could explain how the guy knew about Baltimore.

I liked that thought more than the idea that he'd followed her.

I'd quizzed her about acquaintances in the building, but it hadn't yielded me much in the way of leads.

"_So, has someone talked with you lately about anything that wasn't work related?"_ I'd asked. _"Think back over like maybe a month. He might have been working up the nerve to approach you by doing trivial little things, building up to having a conversation."_

"_Are you kidding me? Come on, Lupo. Can you remember every non-work related conversation you've had over the past month?"_

"_I know, but…maybe someone who made you uncomfortable. Or who popped up in unexpected places."_

She'd thought quietly for a minute, and came up with a few things.

"_Well, Tony brought me coffee a few times over the past couple of weeks. He's never done that before. And Josh was outside of my office a few times, but I think maybe he has a thing for one of the secretaries. Although he did seem to be staring at me through the windows, but…I don't know. And then there's Brian. He asked me out for drinks last month, but he seemed to take it okay when I said no. But you know, all of these guys have been there for years. Since before I got there even."_

I couldn't get past the idea that she had men swarming around her like sharks.

My soon-to-be wife was apparently working on Wisteria Lane.

"_Write down their full names,"_ I'd said_. "I'll check them out."_

So she had and I did, but I didn't get a vibe off of any of them. And the Josh character was actually dating one of the secretaries, so Connie's instinct about him had been right.

"Skillage, dude. Shit!" Mulder shouted suddenly, causing me to nearly jump out of my skin.

"What?"

"Okay, here it is, man. Skill-_age_. Are you feeling me? So I'm cruisin' through the shit, right? And there it is, the same IP. Only it's not the same, right? Your dude just wants it to look the same. So here's the thing. He might not be a kiddie-scripter, man."

"So it _is_ the same IP? Or it's not?"

"It's _not. _But, Lupo, the dude knows you're checkin' him, right? Because why route from one IP to the next in the same building? And why repeat the last IP unless he wants to throw you off course, because the last IP was like…underground."

"Yeah, freemason shit," I said, repeating his description from Saturday.

"Right," he replied with a big grin. "So check it…if your man went through so much trouble to hide it _last_ time, then why put it on the AG dish _now_, right?"

"AG dish?"

"Silver platter, man," he said pointedly, as though I was stupid.

And honestly, I felt stupid around this guy, but I ignored that feeling and instead thought about what it all meant.

Because it finally occurred to me where he was going.

Our guy had to know we'd figured him out. Or at least, that we'd figured out that the IP was from the DA's office. Because this time, he'd used a different one, but he'd made it look the same.

Which meant that maybe we'd already interviewed him, and that's how he knew we'd zeroed in on the DA's office.

"So the real IP," I said as I began to fit the pieces together in my mind. "It's still in the DA's office?"

"For real, Lupo. And this one is dedicated."

"Dedicated. Meaning…you can pinpoint the computer?"

"I'll have to black ops this shit if you want a name," he warned, looking at me guardedly.

"Do it."

Ten minutes later, I had the answer, but now I had more questions.

The email had come from Mike Cutter's computer.

"From his _computer_ or from the IP routed to his office?" I clarified.

"Dude, any_one_ can look like they're any_where_, right?" he told me. "I mean, I can send an email to you right now that makes it look like I'm in Cancun. So, dude…you don't think this Cutter dude is your stalker?"

"No," I replied quickly.

"Then I'm telling you…you're looking for a dude who's _almost_ as good as me."

"Like an IT guy?"

"Could be. Or it could just be some closet geek who went to law school."

"Okay, I hear you," I said as I checked my watch. "Look, I really need to get back. How long will it take you to check for spyware?"

"Spyware?" he asked in amusement. "Dude…you're breakin' my heart."

He turned his back on me without further explanation, but within twenty minutes, I was grabbing Eames from the kitchen and heading out the front door. I had Connie's laptop under my arm and a lead ball in the pit of my stomach.

"What did you find out?" Eames asked me as we got in the car. "And by the way, you _owe_ me for that. That woman is a real piece of work."

"I'll make it up to you," I answered numbly.

"Lupo, what is it? Did you find out who sent the email?"

"No, but I found out something else. The guy put a program on her computer."

"What kind of program?"

"Remote access to the webcam."

Which was why Connie had felt so strongly that night in the hotel that someone was watching her.

Because someone was.

TBC...


	17. Chapter 17

**Bernard POV**

* * *

><p>"I don't want to talk about it."<p>

"I don't see where you have a choice."

"But we've been over this," was the petulant response. And her words were actually accompanied by the stomping of her foot.

Amanda Evans was every bit the stereotypical cougar housewife. If there was such a thing, and I was pretty sure there was.

She was spoiled and haughty and entitled.

Her husband was rich and twenty years her senior, so she spent her days shopping and pampering herself.

Oh, and boffing younger men.

We'd learned that Powers and Gingrich were only two of her lovers, which meant that a new suspect pool had opened up.

Because her husband wasn't our killer.

And Amanda wasn't either. She clearly lacked the physical strength necessary to pull it off.

But I'd bet my next paycheck that she knew who the killer was. Or at the very least, she'd slept with him.

Someone was offing the competition.

We'd wanted to talk to Amanda on Monday, but she'd managed to make herself scarce.

Until today.

"Mrs. Evans," Lauren said, and I could tell that she was losing her patience. "You can either tell us now, here, in the comfort of your own home, or we can take you to the precinct and have you declared a material witness."

"What does that mean?"

"It means that we can compel you to talk."

"You can't compel me to do anything," she retorted condescendingly, and then she sat back on the sofa and crossed her legs, allowing the fabric of her silk robe to fall open and expose most of her thighs.

And I wasn't looking because I was _looking_. I'm just saying…she had that move perfected.

She _wanted_ me to look, and I was annoyed with myself for having fallen into her trap.

I kept my face neutral and brought my eyes up to hers. I wasn't going to say it out loud, but the thought definitely crossed my mind that Lauren has much better legs than she does.

Amanda was staring at me victoriously, and I wanted to say something biting, something to wipe that conceited look from her face, but I didn't.

"We'll give you a minute," I told her. "If you'd like to get dressed."

"I don't think you can drag me off to your dingy little precinct without some kind of warrant or something, so why don't you two show yourselves out?"

I glanced over at Lauren and noticed that she was staring hard at Amanda's legs.

What was she doing?

I mean, I could understand that she'd looked. Like I said, the move was calculated, designed to make people look.

But _still_?

I cleared my throat and stood up, and after a second, Lauren got up, too.

"I'm sorry," Lauren said, shaking her head as she moved closer to Amanda and continued to stare. "But where did you say you were earlier this morning?"

"I didn't say. But I've been home."

"Alone?"

"Detective," Amanda said dismissively to Lauren, even though she kept her eyes focused on me as she deliberately uncrossed her legs and scooted up to the edge of the couch, causing the robe to shift even more. "I don't see how that's any of your business."

"Hey, B.," Lauren said, nodding in the direction of Amanda's exposed thighs.

She was encouraging me to look at something, but I didn't want to look again.

Because I'd already discovered that Amanda wasn't wearing anything under that robe, and I was afraid that since she'd changed positions again that I might be able to see even more than I had already.

I kept my gaze on Lauren, hoping that maybe she'd change her mind about wanting me to look, but she furrowed her brow and tipped her head toward Amanda's legs again, so I finally looked.

Right away, I noticed that my inclination to avoid looking had been dead-on. I couldn't believe this woman was being so blasé about exposing herself.

While I was thinking that, Lauren leaned down close to Amanda and reached out to touch her leg.

Whatever it was that I was supposed to see, I couldn't do it.

I mean, I knew what _Amanda_ wanted me to see.

I just wasn't sure what _Lauren_ was doing.

I moved my eyes away from the peep show and found Amanda staring at me again. She just sat there and smiled as though she was enjoying making me uncomfortable.

Lauren stood back up and chucked me with her elbow and then held out her hand.

"What's that look like to you?" she asked me quietly.

"I'd say it looks like probable cause."

Because Lauren had found a dog hair on the belt of Amanda's robe. The belt that really had no purpose whatsoever because it wasn't holding her robe together, but instead had been lying loosely across her leg.

"Probable cause? What does that mean?" Amanda asked as she hopped up from the couch. I kept my eyes on Lauren as I plucked the hair from her palm.

"I'll bag this," I told her. "You see about getting our suspect decent enough to be taken into custody."

"Suspect?" Amanda questioned shrilly as I left the living room in search of a more g-rated environment.

"Amanda Evans, we're placing you under arrest for murder," Lauren told her.

"But you know I didn't do it! I have an alibi!"

"And you have a dog hair that we're betting matches up to the ones found on the victims. So put on some clothes. Coming with us is no longer an option."

Ten minutes later, Lauren pushed Amanda into the back of our car and then closed the door. I paused near the back of the vehicle on my way around to the driver's side, but I wasn't ready to get in just yet.

"That was a nice catch," I told her, holding up the baggie with the hair.

"You would've made it, too, if you hadn't been distracted by…other things," she said, and it looked like she was fighting to hold back a smile.

"Now, you know I didn't want to look," I reminded her.

"Uh huh. Because guys hate to look at half-naked, beautiful women, right?" she asked, and now I could tell for sure that she was teasing me.

I hadn't expected her to be the type to get upset by something like that, but you never know. I was glad to see that she wasn't like that.

"Okay, first off, when I'm working, I'm not a guy. I'm a cop."

"And second?"

"You should probably classify her as _more_ than half-naked, don't you think?" I asked with a grin.

She laughed and shook her head, turning to go to the passenger side door.

"Hayes," I called out to her.

"What?"

"You didn't ask what the third thing was."

"There's a third thing?" she questioned as she once again met me at the back bumper.

"Uh huh. There was only one beautiful woman in that room, and it wasn't her."

Thirty minutes later, I pulled up outside of the morgue so that Lauren could run in and drop off the dog hair in order for Rodgers to run a comparison.

"I'll be right back," she said as she got out of the car.

"So, what's with little miss over-achiever?" Amanda said as soon as we were alone in the car.

She hadn't opened her mouth during the past half hour, and I was starting to wonder if maybe she was intimidated by Lauren.

Interesting.

Maybe she should do the interrogation by herself. Because if this dog hair matched up, then Amanda's latest lover was most likely our killer.

Arresting her for the murder was just a tactic to get her to come clean with us, and we wouldn't be able to hold onto her for very long, once she called a lawyer.

But if she felt daunted by Lauren, then having her play the heavy might work.

Of course, even if it didn't, we were on the track now. If this hair was a match, then it was just a matter of time.

"Hello!" she shouted in annoyance when I didn't answer her question. "Deputy Fife!"

"Are you talking to me?" I asked her carefully, catching her gaze in the rear view mirror.

"I asked you what's up with the bitch with the stick up her ass."

"I think you'd better exercise your right to remain silent."

"Oh, am I making you mad?"

"No, but you're giving me a headache."

"Men never say those words to me," she said, dropping her voice to a seductive tone. "In fact, I'm thinking that maybe you and I could reach some kind of agreement."

"I seriously doubt that."

"If you let me go, I'll make it worth your while."

"Are you really trying to bribe me with sex?"

"Or money. My husband's loaded."

"You do know that's a crime, right?"

"Having sex with a cop?" she asked in confusion. "I don't think so. I've done it lots of times."

"To get out of an arrest?" I asked, doing my best to hide my amusement.

"No, just because…oh. I get it. The bribery part. Well, can you at least take off the handcuffs?"

I didn't.

I _could_ have.

Because like I said, she wasn't really our suspect.

But she had knowledge of the crime and she'd _definitely_ gotten on my last nerve, so I ignored her request and instead focused on watching Lauren cross the sidewalk as she made her way back to the car.

"Rodgers will call us in an hour," she said as she climbed in and shut the door. I started the engine as she buckled her seatbelt and then she looked up at me and added in a low whisper, "You know, I almost don't want to solve this thing."

I knew what she meant, but it sure did make me feel good to hear her say it, too.

Because we'd been getting along really well, at home and at work. I'd spent quite a bit of time at her place and so far things were great, but I couldn't help but feel like maybe _I_ thought they were better than _she_ thought.

Like on Saturday night, at dinner with the Logans. Lauren had seemed preoccupied and slightly distant, but when I asked her about it after we got back to her place, she'd shrugged it off.

_"Everything's fine,"_ she told me. _"I promise."_

_"Everything,"_ I repeated. _"You're sure? Because if this is too much…"_

_"I'm sure,"_ she insisted.

And then she'd started unbuttoning my shirt, and honestly, I got a little distracted.

On Sunday, we slept in and then we spent some time working before meeting everyone for dinner at Steve-O's.

After Lauren and I filled in the chief on our progress with the case, we'd been summarily outted by the others at the table.

I mean, I suppose it seemed obvious.

We were finishing each other's sentences.

But surely lots of partners did that. I tried to argue my point, but Ross had waved me off.

"_Give it up, Detective," _he told me._ "I threw the rule book out the window months ago."_

The fact that he knew and didn't care was a relief, but I still had the niggling feeling that something was on Lauren's mind.

Were we pushing it too fast?

Maybe, but she'd been the one who wanted to move things along. I'd mentioned taking things slow on several occasions, but she insisted that she didn't want to wait.

We'd worked long and hard, both Monday and Tuesday, in an effort to wrap up this case, and our personal time was down to a minimum.

Although, I still spent the night at her place, just like I'd done every night since Friday.

And she was fun and affectionate and sweet…but twice during the night on Monday, she'd screamed out in her sleep.

The first time had nearly given me a heart attack until I realized that she was only dreaming, and I'd ended up watching her sleep for awhile as my heartbeat went back to normal, and just when I was almost back to sleep, she'd done it again.

But it didn't wake her up, and she didn't mention it in the morning, so I didn't either.

I figured that everyone has their demons.

But then last night it happened again, so this morning, I'd asked.

"Do you remember having a bad dream last night?"

"No," she answered quickly. "Why?"

"You…um…kind of called out in your sleep," I said.

Although _called out_ was really an understatement.

"I'm sorry. Did I keep you awake?" she asked. She turned to get dressed, breaking eye contact with me.

"It's not me I'm worried about."

"You don't need to worry about me. It was nothing. I'm fine."

So I'd let it go.

We were just getting started. If she didn't want to share certain parts of her life with me, I couldn't let it bother me.

And normally, that philosophy works fine for me. I mean, let's face it. I'm a pro at the first few weeks of a relationship. I have lots of practice with the early stage.

It's the middle part that always trips me up.

But even though I'm usually okay with a lack of full disclosure at this point, considering how recently I'd been duped by a duplicitous woman, it was bothering me this time.

Or maybe it was just because I liked Lauren so much more than anyone else to date.

Maybe it was because I wanted to know everything about her, and I'd thought that she was _telling_ me everything, but now that I suspected that she wasn't, I couldn't help but wonder if maybe our relationship was off-balance.

Maybe I liked her a whole lot more than she liked me.

So hearing her say that she didn't want the case to end…something unprompted and definitive like that…it went a long way towards easing my apprehension.

I nodded in agreement as I pulled away from the curb. I would've liked to say more on the subject, but certainly not with a suspect in the car.

Amanda was quiet again for the drive to 1PP, so once we got her inside and put her into an interrogation room, I told Lauren my theory.

"She's intimidated by you. I think you should go in alone."

"Are you sure?" she asked, looking slightly surprised by my suggestion. "We might only get one shot at her before she lawyers up."

"She offered to sleep with me if I let her go," I told her.

"What? When?"

"When you ran in to the lab. I think she likes trying to manipulate men, but she's uncomfortable with women, and she definitely seems leery of you. We'll get more out of her if she doesn't have her sexuality to fall back on."

"Okay," she agreed with a nod. "Okay, so…"

"Bernard! Hayes!"

I turned around and found Alex walking towards us. As was typical, Bobby was right on her heels.

"Are you guys in the middle of something?" she asked.

"Yeah, we just brought in the mistress," Lauren answered.

"Hayes is going to try to get her to cough up the names of her other lovers. Or more specifically, the one she was with this morning. He may be our guy."

"We need a favor," Bobby said. "So how about if we get your girl to talk and you go pick up a guy for a probation violation?"

"What guy?" I asked.

"The one who's harassing Carolyn," Alex told us. "We managed to trace a call and get an address where he might be staying while he's in the city. We were going to pick him up, but he knows us, and we decided that it would be better if he doesn't realize that this has anything to do with Carolyn. We just want to jam him up while we find out what he knows. You can search his place and bring him in for questioning."

"But take him to the 2-7," Bobby added. "We don't want him here."

"What are we busting him for?"

"He didn't check in with his probation officer to let him know that he was leaving the state. That's reason enough."

"Um…okay," I said, looking at Lauren for confirmation. She nodded her agreement, so I handed off the file. "But Alex, you should be the one to talk to our girl."

"Just me?" she questioned as she gave me the paper with the details on Quarles.

"Yeah," Lauren added with a smile. "Bobby, she'd be on you like a cheap suit."

"Oh, she's _that_ kind," Alex said knowingly. "I've got some experience with the type. I'll get what you need."

So we left the two of them in the hall outside of the interrogation room and headed for the squad room.

"Do you guys usually do this kind of thing?" Lauren asked me under her breath. "Trading cases? I mean, don't get me wrong. I'm more than happy to do it, but I was just curious if it was standard protocol."

"No," I admitted on a chuckle. "But clearly there's a new sheriff in town."

TBC...

A/N: Holiday weekend approaching, which means I'm off to the beach :) More on Tuesday!


	18. Chapter 18

**Bobby POV**

* * *

><p>"Is this your overkill killer? I didn't realize you guys were so close to finding him. Or her, I guess."<p>

I looked away from the scene in front of me to glance at my boss as he came into the observation room.

Alex had only been in with Amanda Evans for a few minutes, so the fireworks hadn't yet begun.

Amanda was still sizing up the competition, and Alex was masterfully offering up a false sense of security.

Any minute now, Alex was going to toss a zinger at her and get her riled up.

Or, Amanda would take a liking to her and she might be willing to open up.

Either way, I was pretty sure that the fun was about to start.

"Not exactly," I answered.

"What, she just has information that you need?"

"She doesn't have anything to do with our case."

"Oh," Ross replied simply. "Should I ask?"

"Um…you know how you gave Mike and Carolyn room to work the Jack Quarles thing as long as they kept up their caseload?"

"Yeah," he answered carefully.

"We assumed that authorization bled over to us, too."

"So she ties into him?"

"Well, actually…"

"Spill it, Goren," he said firmly.

Although the funny thing was that this was nothing like the old days.

His directive was issued with slight amusement rather than looking as if he'd smelled something vile.

And it's not like we were taking advantage of him.

Not really.

We were just trying to best allocate our resources, considering there was presently no MCS captain.

This way, we didn't have to run to him with every little thing.

Especially right now when he was trying to stay on top of the case in Baltimore, too.

_**"So tell me, Amanda. What exactly do you get out of screwing more than a dozen men at a time?"**_ Alex was saying, her voice sounding almost too loud through the intercom.

_**"I don't do them all at one time,"**_ Amanda corrected. _**"I'm not into group sex."**_

I reached to adjust the volume, but Ross shook his head and asked curiously, "Who is this woman?"

"She's the mistress of both of the Staten Island ADA's," I explained. "Bernard and Hayes picked her up because they think one of her other lovers is the killer."

"So where are Bernard and Hayes?"

"They went to bust Jack on a probation violation. Alex and I were going to do it, but he knows us."

Ross nodded thoughtfully and said, "So you're handling their interrogation."

"Yes, sir," I said, deciding it would be a good idea to throw in the title of respect.

Because I _did_ respect him, and I wanted to make sure that our game of case-swapping didn't come across as us making a mockery of the department.

"_**I need the names, Amanda," **_Alex said. _**"All of them. One of them is a killer, but you already know that, don't you? You like the idea of someone wanting you that much. Someone willing to kill just so that he can have you for himself. But when's it going to end? After he's killed them all, including your husband? That's a lot of dead bodies."**_

"_**He'd never kill my husband."**_

"_**How can you know that?"**_

"_**Because I don't **_**sleep**_** with my husband,"**_ she retorted smartly. Then she smiled sweetly and added, _**"I just take his money."**_

"She's a gem, huh?" Ross muttered. "I wonder if she's any relation to Nancy."

I stifled a laugh, but he turned around and looked at me with a wry smile on his face.

"Not that I have money or anything," he added. "It's just her take on sex that sounds eerily familiar."

I was glad that Ross could joke about something like that, especially with me, since he'd initially thought I was one of Nancy's conquests.

"Have you spoken with her since she left Baltimore?"

"No. She sent Jeremy a text yesterday, but that was just to remind him to study. I think she's in complete denial."

"What about Jeremy? How's he doing?"

"Actually, that's why I came down to look for you. He said he's starting to piece a few things together."

"That's great."

"It is," he agreed. "But he doesn't want to talk to me about it. He wants to talk to you two."

"He just likes my hot partner," I said, trying to make light of it since it had surely hurt Ross' feelings to know that his son was still shutting him out.

"It's fine," he said. "I can understand that it might be tough to talk with a parent about it."

"So otherwise, things are going okay?"

"I'm getting reacquainted with my kid," he stated with a nod. "And I'm realizing that he's not such a kid anymore. But yeah, it's a good thing."

"I'm glad to hear it."

"So will you two have time, if I have him come down? I mean, between solving everyone else's cases."

"We'll make time," I promised.

We both returned our focus to the goings-on in the other room.

"How come you're not in there?" he asked me.

"This was a one-woman job. The emphasis being on _woman_."

"_**Can I help it if every man falls in love with me?"**_ Amanda was saying. _**"It's not like I go looking or anything. I mean, look at me. I'm a magnet. You understand what I'm saying, don't you?"  
><strong>_

"_**Sure. You can't turn it off, can you?"**_ Alex agreed with heavy sarcasm.

"_**Yeah, like you'd know,"**_ Amanda scoffed. _**"Are you married?"**_

"_**Yes, I am."**_

"_**And wait, let me guess. You've never fooled around on him, have you?"**_

"_**If I wanted to sleep around, then why get married?"**_

"_**You're not getting it. The marriage is the safety net. The affairs are about power. Haven't you ever executed a calculated move, just to get a man's attention?"**_

"_**Of course,"**_ Alex agreed. _**"It's a heady feeling, isn't it?"**_

"Where is she going with this?" Ross asked. "Isn't she just trying to get a name?"

"I think she might get more than that," I mumbled distractedly.

"_**Exactly,"**_ Amanda said with a smile. "_**I can pick up the phone right now and have any one of six different men ready to meet me in an hour. To do whatever I want. How many women can say that?"**_

"_**I can,"**_ Alex boasted. _**"I've got at least that many on speed dial."**_

_**"You said you don't sleep around."**_

_**"And you said that you had men who would do whatever you want. Are you only talking about sex? Because that's the easy part. You know what they say about that. **_**When does a man get to have sex? Whenever he can find a woman to say yes. But a woman…whenever she wants.**_** That's because men have no control over their dicks. I could walk out into the squad room right now and have any man I wanted."**_

I was starting to wonder if maybe I should let Alex know that Ross was listening.

Not that she'd care, but…I had no idea where she was taking this conversation, and since she thought that I was the only one behind the glass, I decided to at least give her a heads-up.

I pulled out my phone and sent her a text that just said _**Ross**_. She read it without missing a beat.

_**"No, the real power,"**_ Alex continued. _**"Is getting them to do other things for you. Don't you agree?"**_

"_**And you have men who do things for you,"**_ Amanda said suspiciously.

"_**I can get any man to do anything I want. Can you?"**_

"_**What, like bring you coffee or something? That's amateur stuff."**_

"_**I get out of speeding tickets all the time."**_

"She doesn't," I said to Ross.

"_**But you're a cop. You guys don't ticket each other."**_

"_**I don't tell them I'm a cop. What kind of challenge would that be? No, I get out of the tickets because I pretend to be interested in them. I give them the helpless female act and it works every time."**_

"Alex has a helpless female act?" Ross asked me.

"She only uses it on suspects."

Amanda smiled at Alex as if they were now partners in crime. Then she leaned in close and said,_** "I almost got out of getting arrested today."**_

_**"You flirted with Detective Bernard?" **_Alex asked, as if she didn't already know.

_**"I might have given him a little preview," **_she admitted._** "And he was going to let me go, too, until his bitch partner came back."**_

Ross glanced back at me, but I just shook my head.

_**"It's a high, isn't it?" **_Alex said in a conspiratorial tone.

_**"Better than any drug," **_Amanda declared_**. **_

Alex looked at the door as if she was nervous that someone might come through it, and then she got up and walked around the table so that she could sit down next to Amanda.

_**"How'd you get him to do it?" **_she asked in a whisper._** "I mean, did you have to sleep with him for awhile first? Or did you promise to do it afterwards? What?"**_

_**"How'd I get who to do what?" **_Amanda replied carefully, but I could tell that Alex had her on the edge.

She _wanted_ to tell her.

She'd forged a bond with Alex and now it was a game of companionable one-upmanship.

"Give her one more story," I said under my breath.

"It's not going to work," Ross argued lightly.

"Yes, it will."

_**"You know, my partner hates to do paperwork,"**_ Alex began casually.

_**"Okay…"**_

_**"I mean, he really hates it. Our boss is on his ass twenty-four seven because his half of the paperwork is always late."**_

"You know she's making this up, right?" I said, but the funny thing was that she wasn't. I mean, the part about Ross being on my ass wasn't true anymore, but I did hate paperwork and he used to be on my ass.

But I knew what story she was going to tell, and for some reason, I was slightly embarrassed to let him hear it because it was most definitely true.

"_**So one night,"**_ Alex continued. "_**We'd arrested this guy, and we got his confession, and then all we had left to do was the paperwork. And this is the city, right? There's a form for everything. But it was almost midnight, and I was exhausted."**_

"_**And you got him to do your half?"**_

"_**Oh, yeah,"**_ Alex said with a smile. "_**And I even made him think it was his idea."**_

The two women shared a laugh, and Amanda looked at Alex approvingly.

"_**So how'd you do it?"**_

"_**Well, you know what you said about offering a preview…"**_

"I don't need to hear this, do I?" Ross questioned.

"It's a fabrication," I assured him, even though I had perfect recall of that night.

Of course, at the time, I didn't realize I'd fallen victim to her ploy. It was before we'd started dating, but definitely after I knew that I was in love with her.

I'd looked up from my desk to find her walking towards me and looking at me with those honey-colored eyes.

"_What?"_ I'd asked quietly as she approached.

"_Nothing,"_ she'd sighed.

She'd just come back from getting a report from the fax machine, but instead of going around to her chair, she stopped at my desk and nudged a hip up onto the edge. In the process, she'd knocked a couple of files off my desk, so then she'd knelt down to pick them up.

And I'd been able to see straight down her shirt.

It sounds juvenile, I know. I even knew it at the time, but I still looked.

In fact, instead of helping her pick up the dropped papers, I kept looking down her shirt. I had to make myself tear my eyes away when she finally stood up and set the files back on my desk.

"_Sorry,"_ she said vaguely.

"_It's okay,"_ I'd replied immediately, feeling at once guilty and aroused by what I'd just seen. "_Tired?"_

"_Aren't you? I'm pretty sure there's a hot bath at home with my name on it." _

"_Go ahead," _I told her as that image had stormed my already over-stimulated brain. _"I'll finish up."_

"_You don't have to do that."_

"_I don't mind. Go home and take a bath. I'll see you in the morning."_

So she'd left, and I'd finished the paperwork.

And I saw her a lot sooner than in the morning. That night, I'd seen her in my dreams. It wasn't anything unusual for me to dream about Alex back then, but that particular one had been memorable.

About a month into our relationship, she'd admitted to me that the move had been intentional.

"_I didn't expect you to do my work for me,"_ she'd explained guiltily. "_I just wanted to see if you'd notice."_

"_Oh, I noticed,"_ I'd assured her. _"And then you had to mention going home to take a bath…"_

"_That part wasn't on purpose. I really did want a bath."_

"_And I really did picture you in it,"_ I admitted. _"Repeatedly."_

That had confession had brought a smile to her face.

Back in the beginning, Alex was fairly insecure with her sexuality. She'd come a long way since then.

_**"That's it?"**_ Amanda asked her. "_**You flashed him a little cleavage and he fell for it?"**_

_**"You have to know your target. Some men like subtle. I'm sure you know all kinds, right?"**_

_**"That's true,"**_ she agreed, nodding thoughtfully.

Alex continued to watch her, waiting for what we both knew was coming next, and I realized after a few seconds that I was holding my breath.

_Come on_, I willed silently.

_**"I held out on him."**_

_**"On who?"**_

_**"Tyler Bradshaw. He's a trainer at the club where I play tennis."**_

_**"A trainer,"**_ Alex said encouragingly, as though she was impressed. _**"He must be buff."**_

_**"Honey, you have no idea."**_

_**"Then why'd you hold out?"**_

_**"I let him have me. Once. And then I told him that he wasn't as good as Chuck. I pretended that I didn't want to be with him anymore."**_

_**"Chuck. You mean Charles Powers, the Staten Island ADA, right?"**_

_**"Uh huh. Of course, Tyler was better. But he was cocky about it, and I thought maybe the competition might make him work harder."**_

_**"Did you realize you were setting Chuck up to be killed? Or were you surprised to learn that he'd done it?"**_

_**"I didn't know,"**_ she said carefully.

_**"But he told you right afterwards, didn't he? Because you knew not to call Chuck any more after his death, even though his name wasn't in the papers."**_

_**"He killed for me,"**_ she said in an oddly proud tone. "_**He wanted me that badly. Have you ever had anyone kill for you?"**_

_**"It made you feel good,"**_ Alex stated rather than answering the question.

She'd definitely had people kill for her, but not like Amanda meant.

It hadn't been done as some power-tripping sexual game.

It had been done to save her life.

"_**You're damn right it made me feel good. But I never meant for it to happen."**_

"Why did she pick Chuck?" I wondered aloud. "She had thirteen other men to pick from. Why him?"

"_**Why Chuck?"**_ Alex asked, as though she could hear me, even though she couldn't.

Ross rolled his eyes at me, but I just shrugged.

"It's the logical question," I reminded him.

"_**What do you mean?"**_ Amanda asked her.

"_**I mean, counting Chuck and Tyler, you were sleeping with fifteen different men. So what made you pick Chuck?"**_

Amanda sat back and looked at Alex uneasily.

_**"It was random," **_she answered.

_**"I don't think so," **_Alex said, losing some of her affability. She leaned closer to Amanda. _**"I think Chuck wanted something from you. Maybe he wanted you to leave your husband, or your other lovers…he pressured you to change somehow and when you refused, he threatened to tell your husband. Because if he knew about all of your extra-curricular activities, then you'd go back to being Amanda Wyler from Eau Claire, Wisconsin."**_

_**"That's not true. Martin would never leave me."**_

_**"Even if he knew every Tom, Dick and Harry were dipping their wicks in your well? Try again, Amanda. No man is that understanding."**_

_**"Look, I didn't know Tyler was going to kill anybody, okay?" **_Amanda argued.

_**"But you hoped that he would. Did he get rough with you? Is that how you knew he'd be the one whose buttons you could push? I mean, you might be able to talk any man into bed, but it's a little tougher to get one to commit murder."**_

_**"Tougher for you, maybe," **_Amanda fired back.

I broke into a full grin at Amanda's statement, and I felt a sense of pride in my wife, especially after Ross said, "Damn, she's good. I thought she lost her ten minutes ago."

_**"Someone like you probably has to work hard just to get laid," **_Amanda stated condescendingly.

Alex had sucked her in perfectly.

The bonding, the sense of kinship, and then the subtle suggestion that Amanda was just the average woman.

And now her vanity was going to make her lash out in order to prove that she was better.

"_**I'd like to see this husband of yours," **_Amanda continued._** "He's probably some pencil-neck geek who can't get it up without popping a pill. Every one of my men could be on the cover of GQ magazine. How's that for power? I've got fifteen men eating out of the palm of my hand."**_

"_**Thirteen," **_Alex corrected.

"_**What?"**_

"_**You only have thirteen men, because you killed two of them."**_

"_**Who cares? I'll have three more by the end of the day, if I want."**_

"Did she just admit that she killed them?" Ross asked. I hummed my agreement, but didn't say anything so that I could keep listening.

"_**And how many more will you ask Tyler to kill? Just the ones who decide they don't want to share you?"**_

"_**I didn't **_**ask**_** Tyler to kill anyone."**_

"_**Just like I didn't ask my partner to do my paperwork. So what did you do? You said you held out on him. Did you dangle the prospect of sex over his head? Did you tell him that after he took care of Chuck then you'd take care of him?"**_

Amanda got up from her chair and walked around the room. Alex sat back and watched, but stayed in her seat.

_**"Chuck wanted me to marry him," **_she admitted at last._** "Can you believe that? Like I would marry a lawyer from Staten Island."**_

"_**You were sleeping with two of them," **_Alex reminded her.

"_**Because they were sexy as hell," **_she retorted._** "Did you see them?"**_

"_**You mean before they were murdered?"**_

Amanda sighed heavily and shook her head.

"_**I told Chuck no, but he kept pushing it. He wanted me to leave Martin, and to break it off with my other guys."**_

"_**So you got Tyler to do your dirty work. What about Lee? Did he want you to leave Martin, too?"**_

"_**No. Lee didn't care. But he knew about Chuck. And about Tyler. See, Tyler has a thing for zoos. He's kind of obsessed with them, and I was making fun of him to Lee one night, and then when that's where Tyler dumped Chuck's body…"**_

_**"Lee guessed that you and Tyler were responsible. ** **So you killed Lee to cover up the other murder."**_

"_**Tyler killed Lee to cover it up," **_she corrected_**. "I didn't kill anybody." **_

"_**Okay, Amanda. I think we're done here," **_Alex said as she stood up.

"_**Good. Thank you. So I can go?" **_she asked hopefully._** "And maybe I can get that other detective's phone number?"**_

"_**You won't be needing it. You'll want to save your one phone call to get a lawyer."**_

"_**But…I told you what happened. You don't believe me?"**_

"_**It's still murder, Amanda. And you're still under arrest."**_

Alex left the room and joined Ross and me in the observation room.

"Nice work, Detective," Ross told her. "Are you two going to go pick up this Tyler Bradshaw character?"

"We'll check in with Bernard and Hayes and get their status. I'd hate to steal their fun," Alex said.

"And your real case?"

"We're interviewing family and co-workers today to see if we can get a feel for her life. We've ordered the LUD's and financials, and Rodgers is supposed to have the full report ready for us after lunch."

"Good. Oh, and Jeremy can be here whenever it's convenient for you. Just call his cell."

"Yes, sir," I agreed. "Thank you."

Ross left us alone in the room and Alex looked at me.

"Jeremy?"

"He wants to talk to us. He's piecing a few things together."

She nodded and said, "Let's call and get the warrant for Tyler, and then find out if Bernard wants us to get him. Maybe we can meet Jeremy for lunch, and then we can get started on the details of Vanessa Sullivan's life."

"You were great. You really had her going."

"She was easy," she deflected. "She's one who comes across as arrogant, but on the inside, she's exceedingly insecure and so she's constantly trying to prove herself. That's why she was so adversarial with Lauren. She felt threatened because Lauren's so attractive."

"Then she should've been terrified of you," I replied.

She rolled her eyes at me and shook her head, but I just stepped closer to her.

We didn't often violate personal space boundaries while at work, but we were alone in the room, and I didn't think it would hurt to allow ourselves a quick moment.

"You could have any man in the squad room that you want?" I asked, repeating her earlier assertion. "And who would that be?"

"You know the answer to that one."

"Yeah, but I want to see you use your feminine wiles to get me."

"I don't have to get you," she replied with a smile. "I have you."

"Don't you want to have me again?" I asked in a low, suggestive tone.

"Are you making me an offer?"

"I'm waiting for you to make me one."

"Okay, how about this?" she posed, so close to me now that I could smell her perfume, and then she lightly ran her hand down my tie. "What if we meet Jeremy later this afternoon so that we can go home for lunch instead?"

"That sounds like an offer I can't refuse."

TBC...


	19. Chapter 19

**Mary Shannon POV**

* * *

><p>I was supposed to have flown back to New York on Sunday evening, but it didn't work out that way.<p>

John got called back to London, and I couldn't get a commercial flight until Monday.

And then when Stan found out on Monday morning that I was still in town, he begged me to help him out with one last case.

_"Two hours, Mary. Tops,"_ he'd promised.

It had taken me two days.

So it was Wednesday before I left Albuquerque.

For the last time.

That thought was a little mind-boggling, and it was probably the cause for my increased smartass-ness.

Well, that and the fact that I was missing John again already.

We'd been apart all week last week, and then I'd spent Friday night with him and we'd flown together to Albuquerque on Saturday, but then he got the call on Saturday afternoon that had him back on his plane.

"_I'm sorry, Mary,"_ he'd told me. _"I'll make it up to you."_

"_There's no making up necessary,"_ I promised.

After all, it wasn't his fault that he was a financial genius who's expert opinion was vital to the deal presently being brokered halfway around the world.

"_Yes, there is," _he'd insisted as we stood together in my kitchen.

There were boxes everywhere because the movers weren't scheduled to come until later that afternoon.

"_So you'll bring me back something,"_ I suggested flippantly. "_You know, one of those crappy t-shirts that says _my boyfriend went to London and all he got me was_…"_

"_Mary,"_ he interrupted as he put his hand on my cheek. _"I'm sorry to make you finish this up alone. And I _will_ make it up to you."_

_"I've always done everything alone. So, go. Be brilliant," _I told him._ "I think I can find my way back to New York." _

Although when I'd said the words, I hadn't expected that it would be three days later than planned.

"Need a cab?"

I looked up to see that a taxi had pulled over in front of me, and the driver was leaning across the front seat looking at me expectantly.

"No, I just like standing on the curb with my hand in the air," I spouted off, rolling my eyes as I hiked my duffle up onto my shoulder.

The cabbie just continued to stare at me, so I added, "Yes, I need a cab!"

He nodded and got out, coming around to pick up my suitcase and then he tossed it into the trunk while I climbed into the backseat.

Fortunately, I'd packed a couple of weeks worth of stuff into the suitcase and the duffle. The rest of my belongings would be in storage until I was able to secure a new apartment, but it also meant that I hadn't gotten stuck wearing the same clothes for three days in a row in New Mexico.

I gave the driver the address for the Millennium, and then I leaned back against the seat and closed my eyes.

I was hoping to only have to stay at the hotel until the first of May. If I was approved for the new apartment, the current tenants were due to move out at the end of April.

John was supposed to fly home tomorrow. And by home, I mean New York. He was planning to make that his primary residence now, instead of Atlantic City. He could still fly down there a couple of days a week, if he needed to, but he could mostly handle the operations from anywhere, and according to him, he liked the idea of living in the same city as me.

I was pretty sure that it wouldn't take him long to change his mind about that, but I was going to enjoy it while it lasted.

A long-distance relationship was completely different from one where we both lived in the same area code, and I wondered if he'd still find my cynical views and sarcastic nature appealing once we started spending a lot more time together.

I hoped so.

Because I really liked him.

I really _loved_ him.

But I still hadn't told him.

When we'd spoken on the phone, just before he came home from England nearly two weeks ago, I'd mentioned that I had things I wanted to tell him.

But when he got back to New York, we'd kind of let our hormones get the better of us. In a really, really good way, but still…in my opinion, it's just not the right time to say _I love you_ for the first time after what we did to each other.

Or maybe it was _exactly_ the right time to say it, I don't know.

But we'd acted like it was like a conjugal visit between two convicts who hadn't had sex in twenty years. We barely came up for air the entire weekend, and then he'd left for A.C. for the week.

When he came back, just this past Friday, I'd once again made plans to tell him.

To say the big L word.

And it wasn't like me to feel so compelled to say it.

I mean, with Rafe, he'd told me a dozen or more times before I'd finally said it back. And even then, I'd never said it with the same conviction.

But see, that was because what I felt for him was nothing like what I felt for John.

I think that I tried to love Rafe because I was _supposed_ to. He was good-looking and nice and he loved me, so why shouldn't I love him back?

But the truth was, I just didn't.

So maybe I was holding back with John because I was afraid of the same thing happening this time, only in reverse.

What if he didn't love me back?

Or what if he thought he did, but it was really only because he was pushing himself to get over Heidi?

That was a scary thought.

And because of that, I'd had to completely remove John from the equation when I'd debated whether or not to take this position in New York.

I wasn't about to make a move like that, based on a guy.

And I felt good about the fact that I'd weighed the pros and cons carefully before making the decision.

The bottom line was that it was a great career move, and I felt like it was time to move on from Albuquerque.

I glanced out the window of the cab when I realized that we'd been sitting still for several minutes.

Traffic had been on my list of cons, that was for sure.

But once I got settled, I'd surely master the subway and then it wouldn't be that big of a deal.

"What's the hold up?" I asked the cabbie.

"It's noon in Manhattan, sweetheart. What'dya expect?"

"That riding in a car would be faster than walking," I muttered as I checked my watch and then pulled out my phone. "You know what? I changed my mind. Let's go to Brooklyn," I told him, and then I spouted off the address.

"Sure thing, sweetheart. I'll get right on that," he fired back, waving his hands around to point out the massive traffic jam in which we were currently stuck.

"Tell me again why I moved to this city?" I said when John answered his phone. It was just after five o'clock in London, so I was hoping that he was done for the day.

"Oh, so you finally made it to New York," he answered, and God what was it about the sound of his voice that just instantly made me feel better?

"I'm in the traffic jam from hell."

"Lady, this is nothing special," the cabbie interjected.

I glared at him for his blatant eavesdropping and he finally reached over and turned on the radio.

"So you haven't made it to the hotel yet?"

"At this rate, I might get there by the Fourth of July," I told him. "And actually, I decided to go by Lauren's building first and see if her manager can push through my application."

"You're going to do that now?"

"I may as well. If I get turned down for another one, I might have to put myself on suicide watch. Who knew it would be this hard to rent an apartment?"

"You don't have to do that," he offered again, although I could tell by the tone of his voice that he expected my decline.

"Yes, I do," I reminded him. "So how are things where you are?"

"Productive, but lonely. We have to stop this business of not seeing each other for days on end."

"I'm all for that," I agreed readily as a warm feeling rolled through me. I tried to block out everything but the sound of his voice.

We talked for several more minutes, and then he said that he needed to go, so I reluctantly ended the call.

I continued to stare blankly out the window as I thought some more about John. I would swear that I could smell his cologne and that I could feel his hands on me…

"Husband?"

"What?"

"Was that your husband?" the cabbie repeated.

"No," I answered with uncharacteristic wistfulness.

And then my usual sarcasm returned and I added, "No, that was my pimp and he booked me a threesome in Brooklyn, so am I going to make it or are there going to be two very disappointed Canadian businessmen in desperate need of getting their rocks off?"

"You know, you got a mouth on you," he retorted, although he shook his head and smiled.

"I hear that a lot," I told him.

I scrolled through the contacts in my phone and then made another call.

"Hayes," she answered, sounding slightly breathless.

"What is it about sex that makes it okay to go forever when it's been forever, but once you start having it again you can't go three days without it?" I posed. "Or at least, not without turning into a sappy, bitchy, hormonal mess."

She laughed and said, "Um…because it feels good?"

"Yeah," I agreed longingly. "There is that."

"Did you need me for something?" Hayes asked good-naturedly. "I'm kind of in the middle of…something."

"Yeah, I'm heading to your building to fill out the paperwork, and I wanted to make sure that you're still okay with me putting you down as a reference. You know, because of that whole unstable thing."

"You're on your way _here_?"

"You're there? I thought you'd be working."

"I am. Sort of. We went to pick up this guy for questioning, but he's apparently in the wind. My place was on the way back to 1PP, so I just…I came by here because…I'm on lunch."

"Oh, okay," I replied. "Well, yeah, I'm headed there now. I just didn't want you to feel obligated to officially vouch for me or anything. I mean, I appreciate that you put in a good word for me because it really helped me out a lot, and…"

"Mary, it's fine. Put me down."

"You're sure?"

"Positive."

"Okay, great. Thanks. So, I guess unless the manager hates me on sight, we'll be neighbors now, huh? You'll get to hear me bitch and moan on a regular basis."

"Do you plan to do a lot of that?" she asked on a laugh, and then I thought I heard another, more masculine laugh in the background.

"Oh yeah. I'm pretty good at it," I answered distractedly as I strained to hear the man's voice again. "Hey, did you go home _for_ lunch or did you go home _at_ lunch for…"

"I've got to run, Mary. Call me when you know something for sure, okay? I'll help you get settled."

Hayes hung up after I hummed my agreement and I sat there and stared at the phone.

Was it Bernard?

I hadn't asked her about him, after she'd confessed to kissing him when I saw her Friday night.

And he _had_ come to pick her up, so…

I sighed heavily and shoved my phone back into my pocket.

Now I was _really_ missing John.

"Okay, sweetheart. That'll be forty-three fifty," the cabbie told me as he pulled over in front of what would hopefully be my new building. I began digging through my purse, but then looked up again when I heard the driver say, "Thanks, buddy. I appreciate it."

It was John, standing on the sidewalk. He'd just handed the driver a few twenties, and now he was reaching to open my door.

For some reason I wanted to burst into tears while at the same time I was ready to throw him down on the sidewalk and have my way with him.

Instead, I climbed out of the car and went into his arms and said, "I thought you were still in London."

"I wanted to surprise you," he replied, running his hand over my ponytail before tugging on the ends of it. It was something he liked to do, and honestly, if anyone before him had ever tried that move, I would've decked him, but when John did it, it just made me feel so…special.

"You did," I agreed.

"It's a good thing you mentioned that you were coming here. I was halfway to the hotel when you called."

"That would've been a romantic comedy in the making."

I heard my suitcase thud against the sidewalk near my feet, but I didn't take my eyes away from John's.

It was ridiculous how much I'd missed him.

"So you don't mind that I hijacked your meeting with the apartment manager?"

"Are you kidding me? Just because I don't want to mooch off of you by living in your hotel doesn't mean I won't take advantage of your reputation. There's no way he'll turn me down when he sees you with me."

"You think I make you look more stable?" he asked with a grin.

"Well, there's not much hope of that, but maybe he'll be so impressed by you that he'll forget all about me."

"Who could possibly forget about you?" he replied and his tone sent waves of pleasure rolling through me.

I felt like an idiot since I couldn't seem to stop smiling and yet I just didn't care.

"I'm so happy you're here," I told him, hugging him tightly again.

"Me, too. So let's go take care of business, and then go back to the hotel. I brought you a present."

"A crappy t-shirt?" I teased.

He laughed and put his arm across my shoulders as together we went up the front steps of the building.

"Not exactly, but I think you'll like it."

TBC...


	20. Chapter 20

**Connie POV**

* * *

><p>"He's been watching me through my computer?"<p>

I knew that my voice sounded unnaturally high, but I couldn't do anything about it.

And I thought I'd been creeped out _before_.

"He managed to gain remote access to the web cam," Lupo explained in a soft, soothing tone.

I had to give him points for his effort to rein in the anger that was surely there, just beneath the surface.

He'd sent me a text nearly three hours ago, stating that he needed to talk to me, but I'd been in court. I managed to send him a reply that said I would call when I got out.

I was finally able to call twenty minutes ago.

Ten minutes ago, he'd come into my office.

But instead of talking there, he'd taken me out into the hall, lightly holding onto my arm while he looked around for a private place to talk.

He finally went over to a secretary's desk and grabbed a pen and paper. He hastily wrote something down and then traded the pen for a piece of tape.

"Lupo, what…"

"Just hang on," he urged, once again taking me by the arm.

We went down the hall to the men's room, and he stuck his head in, looking around to see if it was empty.

Since it was, he slapped his homemade sign on the door – _**Out of Order**_ – and then the two of us went inside.

"It's the only place I know for sure isn't being watched and recorded," he explained when I looked at him questioningly.

And then he'd proceeded to give me the news.

"You think it's one of our IT guys?" I asked him as I tried not to think about the things the stalker might have seen.

Not the least of which was Lupo and me making love in the hotel room in Baltimore.

"I don't know, but if he has the ability to put something like that on your laptop, then the odds are good that it's on your work computer, too. Mulder said it could've come in an email attachment, or a link that you might have clicked on…he said that this guy's that good."

"If it's just on my computer, then why are we hiding in the men's room?"

"If he likes to watch, then he may be watching more than just you," he explained. "He could've hacked the security system. A guy like that gets off on being able to pry into people's personal lives. He found a way into Cutter's computer, too."

"How do you know that?"

"The last email came from his IP."

"Lupo, this is…bad. I mean, not just for me, but for the entire office. If he's got carte blanche to any computer he wants…"

"I know. It's actually a good thing that he's fixated on you. Think of the damage he could do if he started playing around with the system."

"I have to tell Mike."

"I know," he agreed quickly. "But I wanted to tell you first."

"In case I had a meltdown?" I asked with an uneasy smile.

"I nearly had one myself," he admitted. "But lucky for us, Mulder's smart when it comes to this kind of thing. He found the hack, but he left it alone. And he closed the laptop before telling me about the camera, so as far as our guy knows, we've traced the IP, but that's it. He doesn't know that we've found out about the web cam."

"So now what?"

He put his arms around me and pulled me to him, tucking my head into the crook of his neck.

"We have to keep acting like everything's fine," he said softly. "Until we can catch him."

"You mean pretend that there's not the possibility of the two of us being plastered all over the internet?"

"I guess now we know how Carolyn feels," he commiserated. He gently swayed back and forth as he continued to hold me, running his hands soothingly over my back. "But I'd much rather show my ass to the world than have something happen to you."

"Where's Eames?" I asked as it suddenly occurred to me that I hadn't seen his temporary partner.

"He's in the security office. We've been going through the footage, looking for anything suspicious. After we bring Cutter up to speed, we'll all go talk to McCoy and get authorization to let Mulder scour the whole system."

"You think he can do that without being detected?"

"Honestly? He's probably already done it," he replied, chuckling lightly. "He's just waiting for permission so that he can give us his official report."

"The good news," he continued. "Is that guys like that are rarely physical. He's trying to incite fear."

"Well, he's done a good job," I admitted. "But what does that get him?"

"Maybe he's planning something…a moment when you'll turn to him for help. I'm telling you, it's someone you know. It's just that so far, he's been able to avoid arousing your suspicion."

He released me from his embrace and then ran his hands down my arms, letting his fingers lightly clasp onto mine.

He met my gaze and said firmly, "So don't trust anyone in this building. Don't be alone with anyone, okay? And if you find yourself in a situation that makes you uncomfortable…"

"Then I get to practice my moves," I finished.

"React first, and apologize later," he said with a nod. "I'd rather you give the wrong guy a black eye than the alternative."

I closed my eyes and let out a deep breath.

"I'm ready for this to be over," I confessed quietly.

"You could take some time off," he suggested. "Maybe go visit Ben."

"I'm not running away, Lupo. I didn't mean that. I just…I want to catch this guy."

"I'm doing the best I can, sweetheart."

An hour later, we stood in the rotunda of the courthouse with Mike Cutter and Jack McCoy.

"Someone's accessing the District Attorney's computer system?" Jack repeated loudly. "How does something like that happen?"

"Hackers are getting smarter," Mike responded.

"I don't like that answer," Jack snapped back, and then he looked at Lupo. "What are you doing about it?"

"We're trying to trace it," he answered. "If I can get your permission…"

"Do whatever it takes," Jack interrupted. "I want this guy caught. And Connie, I wish you would've come to me sooner."

"They came to me," Mike spoke up. "We thought it was a simple case of stalking."

"There's nothing simple about a stalker, and when one of my people is threatened, I need to know about it. We'll get you a police detail."

"No," I said quickly. "I'm fine. Chief Ross already made me the same offer, but really…"

"So you told the Chief of D's about this and not me?"

"I had to get permission to officially work the case," Lupo explained, and I could tell that he was getting annoyed.

Although, so was I.

It almost seemed like Jack was more worried about who knew what when than about catching the guy.

"And they're friends, Jack," Mike added. "It stands to reason…"

"It stands to reason that when an ADA is in danger, I should be notified," he responded, raising his voice and moving to stand a little straighter.

I think he liked that he had a few inches on Mike, but I have to admit to appreciating the fact that Mike never backed down from Jack, no matter how intimidating he tried to be.

And of course, Lupo could take either one of them out in a heartbeat, so he wasn't bothered at all by the shameless and pointless posturing that was presently going on.

And why was it that I was turned on by that knowledge?

Maybe I'd finally reached my breaking point, because instead of being flustered by the fact that my two bosses were going toe to toe over the handling of a stalker who was after _me_, I'd tuned them out so that I could give my fiancé the once-over.

He was wearing my favorite dark brown suede jacket, along with jeans and a light blue oxford shirt. His tie was slightly askew, but that was typical. He wasn't really cut out for the suit and tie kind of wardrobe, so he tended to make it as casual as possible while still following the dress code.

He needed to shave and he _really_ needed a haircut, but again…I don't know what it is about that rugged look, but I like it.

He'd worried for the longest time that he wasn't polished enough for me, and I think maybe he was finally getting it.

I like _un_polished. To an extent anyway.

And he was exactly the right amount.

As Jack and Mike continued to go at each other, Lupo caught me staring at him.

He smirked at me while Jack tossed out words like _unorthodox_ and _egotistical_ and _insubordinate. _

"Do you have anything to say about this?" Jack asked, looking at me with unmasked irritation. "Because I'm pretty sure you know the way to my office, too. Is there a reason why this was all going on without my knowledge? What if something had happened?"

I wasn't sure if he meant in the sense that he would feel bad for _me_, or just that it would look bad for _him_.

And don't get me wrong. Jack was a decent boss. I'd liked him a lot better when he was the EADA, but he was still okay.

And I still felt a certain amount of gratitude to him for teaching me the ropes when I'd first started this job.

But I think he forgot what it was like to be in the trenches.

Threats are received from time to time.

It happens.

"Right now, I'm wishing I hadn't told either one of you about it," I admitted. "Look, Lupo and Eames are handling the investigation. They need permission to allow a computer expert to roam freely through our database. If you're giving them that permission, then I think that's all that matters at the moment."

"That's all that matters?" Jack repeated, looking at me incredulously. "What happens when this guy starts accessing official documents? What if he alters plea agreements or sentencing recommendations?"

"That's why we need access," Lupo stated. "We'll catch this guy before any of that happens. It's actually a good thing that he turned out to be infatuated with Connie. Otherwise, we might never have known that he was able to gain unfettered access."

Jack stared at Lupo for another minute and then gave him a sharp nod.

"Fine. I expect hourly updates, Detective."

He walked off, leaving Lupo and me standing with Mike.

"I'm sorry, Mike. I'm not sure why he was so upset with you about this," I said.

"Because he hates it when I have information that he doesn't," Mike replied with a wry grin, apparently unaffected by Jack's dressing-down. Then he looked at Lupo and said, "So what's next?"

"I'm going to go pick up Mulder and bring him back to your office. If you don't mind, I want to let him work from there. When I talked to him last, he was working on a program that would bypass the security and web cam feeds so that it would instead show a continuous loop. That way, the guy won't be able to continue monitoring our investigation through that venue and hopefully it'll fool him long enough to let us catch him."

"Do it," Mike agreed quickly. "I'm due in court in about five minutes, but help yourself to whatever you need."

He started to walk away and then he turned back and added to Lupo, "You're going to walk her back to the office first?"

"Of course," he answered.

"Good. Okay, I'll see you two later."

When he left, Lupo and I went outside.

"You seem awfully calm," he commented as we began the walk back to my office.

"I know. It's strange, but maybe it's like you said. Maybe knowing that he's the kind of guy who must spend hours behind a computer has me feeling a little more safe."

"Calm is good," he agreed. "But don't underestimate his obsession. He's taking a huge risk just so that he can keep tabs on you. He's got an endgame in mind."

"Well, so do I," I said confidently. "It's going to end with him eating through a straw in Sing Sing."

He barked out a laugh and reached over to kiss my cheek.

"I like the spunky side of you," he said. "But I've got to tell you…I've got another scenario in mind for this guy."

"Just be sure to play it by the book," I reminded him.

He flashed me an smile and innocently asked, "Who me?"

"Uh huh," I answered, matching his smile.

I can't explain why I was suddenly in such a good mood considering the gravity of my current situation, but I was.

I felt happy.

"You were checking me out back there," he commented.

"Yes, I was," I agreed with a smile.

"Pretty blatantly, too. Right in front of your bosses," he said, and he was obviously pleased by that fact. "I remember the first time I saw you do that."

"Well, the first time you caught me wasn't the first time I'd done it," I told him.

"You made a habit out of checking me out?"

"Why do you think I made so many trips to the 2-7? Half of the time, a phone call would've done it," I pointed out.

By this time, we'd arrived at the front of my office building, and I noticed a co-worker coming down the stairs.

I was still holding Lupo's hand, and oddly enough, that's where my colleague's gaze settled.

"Nice day for a walk, isn't it, Counselor?" he finally said to me as Lupo and I passed him.

"Yes, it is," I agreed.

But for some reason, I just got a weird feeling.

I cast Lupo an uncertain glance and he immediately turned around and began following the guy, who I was pretty sure worked on the second floor.

"Hey!" Lupo called out to him. "Hang on a minute."

"What do you want?"

"What's in the bag?"

The guy – Ronnie? Donnie? – had a backpack slung over one shoulder and it looked to be heavily weighted down, causing him to lean conspicuously to one side.

"None of your business," he replied uneasily, looking back toward me as though I was going to help him.

I wasn't.

"I think it is my business," Lupo said, flashing his badge and putting one hand on the guy's chest, edging him toward the exterior wall of the building.

"I don't care what kind of badge that is. You still need a warrant to search my property. Right, Counselor?"

"Ever hear of probable cause?" Lupo said as he grabbed onto the bag.

But the guy didn't let go, and they ended up playing a game of tug-of-war with it.

"A backpack is cause? Come on, this is crazy."

Lupo easily won the battle for the bag and he shook it lightly, as though testing its weight.

"There have been a series of crimes committed in the DA's office over the course of the past month," Lupo said smoothly, and I suppose that was true, but I was struggling to come up with a valid argument for his probable cause assertion.

"What kind of crimes?"

"Computer hacking. Do you have a laptop in here?"

I figured I could argue probable cause for that one.

Maybe.

"Yeah. So does most everyone else who works in the building."

"Well, then you'll be my first of many," he told him as he unzipped the backpack.

"Connie, are you going to just stand there and let him violate my constitutional rights?"

"Connie?" Lupo repeated sharply. "Are you two on a first name basis?"

"No," I answered, even though it hadn't been directed at me.

"What do you do in that building?"

"I work in the mailroom."

"Why do you need a laptop for working in the mailroom?"

"It's my personal computer," he responded in annoyance. "What, do I need a permit to carry electronic equipment?"

"Keep being a smartass," Lupo told him. "You're not helping your case."

"What case?"

"Do you make a habit out of addressing ADA's by their first names?"

"No."

"So, Miss Rubirosa is special, is that it?"

"She's nice. She's the only one who ever thanks me when I bring her things."

"And what kind of things do you bring her?" Lupo asked him as he continued to search through the bag. "Denny."

Denny. I'd been close.

"Mail," he answered. "Anything sent over by courier. You know, _work_ stuff."

"So if I turn on this computer, I'm not going to find a single file on here pertaining to Miss Rubirosa, is that right?"

"No," he said quickly.

And I may not be a cop, but even I could tell he was lying.

I took a step closer as my curiosity got the better of me.

Could this really be the guy?

I couldn't imagine a less-imposing stalker.

"Let's take this inside," Lupo said, clearly having come to the same conclusion as me. "I need to take a look."

"No way," Denny insisted as he tried to take the bag from Lupo's hands. "I know my rights. You can't just rifle through my stuff."

"We can walk inside, or I can take you down to 1PP," Lupo warned. "It's your choice."

With one hand still on the chest of Denny, Lupo dropped the backpack and pulled out his cell phone.

"Eames, I need you out front. We have a situation."

The security office is on the first floor, so Eames was outside in less than a minute.

"Denny here was acting suspiciously," Lupo explained to his partner. "I need you to keep an eye on him while I see what kind of information he has on his computer."

I saw Eames raise an eyebrow at Lupo, but at the same moment, Denny caved.

"Fine. Look at it. I don't care. It's just a video anyway."

"What's just a video?" I asked, his words filling me with dread.

"I got an email about an hour ago, okay? It had a WMV attached. I saved it to the desktop because I thought…well, I thought it was kind of…I don't know. Cool."

I met Lupo's gaze as my face grew hot with embarrassment.

So this guy…Mailroom Denny…he'd watched a sex video of me and Lupo.

"Wait here," Lupo told Eames and Denny, and then he picked up the backpack and together the two of us went inside.

"Oh my God, Lupo. I know I joked about this, but I didn't actually think it would get out there. What if he emailed it to Mike? Or Jack?"

"Let's look at it first," he said with forced calm.

It felt like it took an eternity for the computer to boot up, but when it was finally ready, Lupo clicked on the file.

As I watched the images on the monitor, I felt a myriad of emotion roll through me.

Surprise.

Unease.

Fear.

And relief.

Because it wasn't a sex video.

It was homemade, something spliced together from various sources.

Me, on the courthouse steps.

Me, in the office.

Me, walking down the street.

But that wasn't the creepy part.

Well, it was, considering someone had been videotaping me without my knowledge, but I was kind of already past that.

The really creepy part was the background music.

It was an old rock and roll song from the eighties.

_**I used to love her…but I had to kill her.**_

TBC...


	21. Chapter 21

**Logan POV**

* * *

><p>"You think he knew we traced him?"<p>

"No, I think he's just staying mobile. He knows she's smart enough to pop him for probation violation."

I was sitting with Bobby at a table in McNally's.

Alex and Carolyn had gone up to the bar to get our drinks since the waitress hadn't come by our table yet.

It had been my suggestion for them to go.

Not because I was desperate for a drink, but because I wanted a few minutes alone with Bobby.

I was trying to take this whole thing in stride, but it wasn't easy.

And at the same time, I'd promised Carolyn that I'd matured enough to be able to handle anything, so I didn't want her to know that I was struggling with it.

"It's bugging you, isn't it?" he asked me.

I glanced over toward the bar and saw that the bartender was just now taking their order.

I'd have about another two minutes.

"Wouldn't it bug you?" I posed. "I mean, think about it. What if Joe was still around, and you found out that he was hanging on to a stash of honeymoon pictures."

"That was a long time ago," he answered calmly.

But I know him well. I saw the muscle in his jaw tighten, and I'd noticed the slight pause before his response.

"Yeah, but _think_ about it," I insisted.

And maybe it wasn't very nice of me to push the issue, but I really needed to know if I was the only one who felt this way.

If it was my neurosis that was causing me to become obsessed with those pictures.

Because I couldn't help but wonder about them.

I wondered what she'd looked like back then.

I wondered about the things they'd done together.

I wondered what it was about Jack that had made Carolyn sleep with a married man.

Which was why I had to know if Bobby might wonder about the same things, or if I was alone with my reaction.

Because if this was just a guy problem, then I'd work through it.

But if it was a _Logan_ problem, then maybe I needed to talk to a professional.

"I don't want to think about anyone else being with Alex. Ever," he admitted firmly. "I don't care how long ago it might have been. And just because I know she was with other men before me, that doesn't mean I want to try to conjure up a mental image, and I sure as hell don't want to think about whoever she was _with_ doing that either."

It was a guy problem.

Good.

Because I really hate shrinks.

"So you can understand why it's getting to me. And you know, I almost want to see them, because I think that maybe I'm making it worse in my mind."

"Good luck getting her to show them to you."

"Yeah," I agreed thoughtfully. "And that's another thing. _She's_ seen them."

"So? She was there, remember?"

"Yeah, but seeing them now…it's different. She's worried about the images being burned in my brain, but now they're burned in _her_ brain."

"You think she's picturing him when she's with you?"

"No. I mean, I don't think so."

Did I?

"Look, from what I've seen, she's completely distraught over the fact that those pictures even exist. She's not using them to create a different sexual experience. If anything, she's having nightmares about them."

"So you think I shouldn't ask her."

"To look at them?" he questioned. "I don't know. If I was in her position…there's no way I'd want to show them."

I sat back and in my chair and cast another glance towards the bar.

The bartender was just setting the fourth glass down on the bar.

"You have to let it go."

"What?" I asked distractedly.

I'd been staring at Carolyn as she smiled at something the bartender said to her.

"The pictures," he explained. "You just have to forget about them. And you won't be able to do that until Jack is behind bars, so between now and then, I don't know…take your own pictures. Hell, make a video, I don't know. But keep the focus on the two of you instead of on him. Because that's what he was hoping would happen. I mean, let's face it. If you weren't with her, then she probably wouldn't care at all about those pictures. Aside from the embarrassment, the evidence of their affair wouldn't have been enough to blackmail her."

"He was testing her," I mused. "He wanted to see how important I am to her. He threatened to go public with the pictures…he mentioned the possibility of murder charges against me…my mother…"

"He was feeling her out to see what would work."

"It all worked. You should've seen her…"

"Which tells you what?" he asked pointedly.

"That none of the crap from twenty years ago should make a damn bit of difference," I stated. "Because she loves me."

"There's hope for you yet, Mike," he said with a grin.

"Hope for Mike?" Alex repeated as she approached the table. "I'd say that was the liquor talking, but you haven't started drinking yet."

She set down a pint of beer on the table and then turned to take another glass from Carolyn, who'd had to carry three due to Alex's limited capacity. I was amazed that she was still wearing her sling, now nearly two weeks after re-injuring her shoulder.

I idly wondered what Bobby had to do to make that happen, and then I decided that I probably didn't want to know.

"Ha ha," I retorted childishly to Alex. She smirked at me and then sat down beside Bobby. Carolyn handed me a glass and then slid in next to me.

"Oh, hey, you guys should've seen Alex today," Bobby said suddenly, and I appreciated that he was changing the subject.

It wasn't that I didn't want Carolyn to know what we'd been talking about.

I was just _done_ talking about it.

For now, anyway.

Tonight, I just wanted to relax and unwind and have good conversation with our friends.

"What'dya do? Leap tall buildings in a single bound?"

She flashed me a sarcastic smile and said, "I closed Bernard and Hayes' case for them. It's nothing impressive, though. She was easy."

Alex liked to deflect praise, so I was pretty sure that it hadn't been nearly as easy as she wanted us to believe. She's got a great interrogative technique.

"So Lauren will be going back to the 2-7?" Carolyn asked.

"I guess so," Bobby said with a nod. "Alex got the accomplice to cough up a name, and then the two of them picked the guy up this afternoon, so the ADA killer is officially caught."

"But it's not the guy who's after _our_ ADA?" I clarified.

"No," Alex answered. "I ran into Lupo this afternoon, but I didn't get much of a chance to talk to him. He mentioned something about a hacker gaining access to the DA's computer system."

"So the stalker is a hacker?"

She shrugged in response, but then said, "I told him that they should stop by tonight if they had time, so we'll see."

"How's your floater case coming?" Bobby asked us.

"We've just about got it," Carolyn answered. "Our prime suspect apparently had a business meeting in Boston today, but he's due back at work in the morning, and we'll be waiting for him."

"That was quick," Alex remarked.

"Yeah, well you two aren't the only good detectives in Major Case," I said with a grin. "So what about you guys? You solved Bernard's case, but how about your own? What did Ross call the guy? The overkill killer?"

"Clever," Alex said with a roll of her eyes. "But yeah, that's our guy."

"It's a work in progress," Bobby admitted. "We're still trying to track down the victim's boyfriend."

"Is he a suspect?"

"He's got motive," Alex said with a nod.

"What did Liz determine was the cause of death?" Carolyn questioned.

"Antifreeze. And of course, Bobby guessed it."

"I smelled it," he said casually, as though it was common practice to recognize the scent of antifreeze on a victim who'd been shot and strangled. And stabbed.

"So he poisoned her? Before or after the other stuff?"

"Before. And then he attempted several different methods to finish her off, but in the end, it was the antifreeze that got her," Bobby explained. "The thing is, we found record of a similar death in Fayetteville, North Carolina back in 2008."

"Home of the 82nd," Carolyn commented. "Your vic is army, right?"

"But how does that relate?" I asked. "Is the boyfriend army, too?"

"Uh huh," Alex said with a nod. "And he was stationed at Bragg at the time of the other murder. It's still unsolved."

"But in that case, there was no antifreeze," Bobby added. "The victim died from the gunshot."

"Maybe he used the antifreeze to help subdue the victim," Carolyn suggested. "It would have made her much more compliant."

Bobby nodded thoughtfully and then glanced at Alex.

"I'll get the full report on the other victim," she told him. "And we can find out if she had defensive wounds. If she fought back, it might explain the variance in MO."

"If it's the same guy," Bobby clarified. "Two female victims, three years and hundreds of miles apart…"

"With multiple types of injuries and the army connection? I'll be surprised if it's not the same guy. Find the boyfriend, and you've found your killer," I stated.

I leaned back in my chair and put my arm around Carolyn.

Some of my self-imposed stress was finally starting to wear off.

It helped tremendously to know that Bobby was of the same mind as me about those old pictures.

I tended to use him as a measuring stick against myself.

He'd come a long way since his broken childhood, just like me, and I trusted his opinion of what a normal, healthy male reaction should be to something like my current situation.

Not that there was anything normal about an old lover showing up with dirty photos, but still…like I said, I trusted Bobby to call foul if I suddenly started acting like a jerk.

Of course, Carolyn would probably tell me, too, but considering the guilt and shame she was carrying around at the moment, it might take her a little longer to recognize it.

"So we put in the request for the file on Cher Quarles," Carolyn said. "It should be here tomorrow. I told them to send the lab results directly to Liz."

"And we got the file from the investigation into my mother's death," I added.

"Any red flags?" Alex asked.

"I didn't look at it yet," I admitted as Carolyn reached into her bag and pulled it out. "I'd rather if you guys checked it out."

"Us?" Bobby asked. He looked like he wanted to ask more, but then he closed his mouth as Carolyn passed him the file.

"If you have time," she told them.

"Of course," Alex promised. "We'll look at it tonight."

"I just…I don't want to go down that road again. Not if I don't have to," I said.

"We're hoping that the two of you might be a little more objective. Just look through the facts and see if there's anything that might be construed as a cover-up."

That was what one of the latest texts had suggested. That my cop friends had swept it all under the rug, and that I'd essentially gotten away with murder.

I'd only been with the department for a few years when she died.

Even if I _had_ killed her, I can't imagine that I would've been tight enough with anyone to even attempt a cover up of that magnitude.

_I mean _now_, maybe_, I thought wryly.

Bobby and Alex would cover for me.

Lupo, too.

But the thing was that I wasn't a killer.

Which was why they _would_ try to cover for me.

Because if I did kill someone, there would have to be mitigating factors.

"We'll take care of it," Bobby assured us.

The waitress finally came to our table, so we ordered another round.

"We talked to Jeremy this afternoon," Alex said after the waitress left.

"How's he doing?" Carolyn asked her.

"Better, I think. But Kelly's death is finally sinking in. He's going to Baltimore tomorrow for her funeral."

"Ross is going with him, I hope," I said.

"He and Liz both," Bobby told us. "I told Ross not to let the boy out of his sight, because you know…if someone set him up for that murder, then they might not be too happy that he's not been arrested."

"You think someone will try to hurt him?"

"I don't know. But there's no need to risk it."

"Is he remembering anything yet?" I asked.

The two of them looked at each other for a moment and then Alex nodded slowly.

"He said that…he had a dream. We think it's a regained memory."

"He was lying facedown on a bed," Bobby began. "He said he could feel a hand on his back, like someone was holding him in place."

"The killer?" Carolyn questioned with interest.

Alex shook her head and said, "It's hard to say. He also said that at the same time, he could hear Kelly calling his name."

"So maybe someone was holding him down while a partner was stabbing her?" I suggested.

"And she was calling to him for help," Bobby added.

"So it's either a memory or it's a complete figment of his imagination," Alex said. "I mean, I'd like to think that it's real. I really want to believe that someone set him up. But the truth is that we just don't know yet."

"Have you thought about hypnosis?" Carolyn posed. "I mean, maybe it's not just the drugs that caused the holes in his memory. Maybe it's shock, too. It's possible that he could recover some of it, if the treatment was done properly."

"That's not a bad idea," Bobby said. "Maybe we'll talk to Olivet."

"Or Skoda," I said quickly.

"Or Skoda," Alex agreed.

"She's a good psychiatrist," Carolyn said practically. "You don't have to avoid talking about her just because she's a former lover. Liz talked with her last month, so she might feel comfortable using her for Jeremy."

I stared at her, as she played with her glass, until she finally looked at me.

"It doesn't bother you?" I asked her.

Because I _wanted_ it to bother her.

I wanted it to make her crazy to think about me with someone else, just like it made me crazy thinking about her with Jack.

"Talking about Olivet?"

"Yeah," I answered.

"No," she replied casually. "Why should it? I mean…"

"Carolyn," Alex interrupted, and then the two of them shared a pointed look.

"Okay, fine," Carolyn said sharply. "Yes, it bothers me. It bothers me a lot, okay? I don't even like that Liz went to see her, which is ridiculous because Liz is my friend, not my spouse, but I can't help but feel a sense of territoriality. So you have to know that if I don't even want a friend going to see her, then I damn sure don't want you within a hundred yards of her. In fact, I don't want you talking about her or thinking about her, or…"

"Okay," I said soothingly. "I just…I had to know."

It didn't bother me to have this conversation in front of Alex and Bobby. And maybe it should have, I don't know.

But they know us better than anyone.

Hell, they probably already knew we were going to have this exact conversation before a single word was spoken.

"Because you wanted to know if I'm as insanely jealous as you are?" Carolyn asked. "Because you're still having trouble not thinking about Jack."

I glanced at Bobby briefly before shifting my gaze back to my wife.

"Yes. But that doesn't mean I'm not glad you told me. You have to know that. I'm dealing with this, but it's so much better to know the truth than to be kept in the dark."

"I know," she agreed. And then she smiled and leaned her head against my shoulder and said, "And yes, I'm just as insanely jealous as you."

And maybe it wasn't healthy that I equated her ability to be jealous with the intensity of her love for me, but whatever.

It worked for us.

I squeezed her tightly to me and kissed the top of her head.

"Okay, well, that's settled," Bobby said. "We'll let Ross know to give Skoda a call."

"Good idea," I agreed.

"Well, look what the cat dragged in," Alex remarked as she looked past my shoulder, towards the front door.

I turned around to find Lupo walking into the bar. He glanced around the room briefly before settling his focus on our little table in the back, but as he got closer, his face clouded over.

"Where's Connie?" he asked sharply.

"We haven't seen her," I answered.

"Shit," he muttered as he turned around and headed back towards the door.

"Wait up," I called out as I chased after him. "What's going on? She should've been here by now?"

We went outside and he looked both ways, up and down the sidewalk.

"I was raking Denny over the coals about that video," he said as he pulled out his phone. "She called and said she was done, and I asked her to wait, but she said she'd get someone to walk with her and that she'd meet me here."

"How long ago?" I asked.

"Um…thirty-five minutes," he answered. "Damn, I should've made her wait. I should've thrown the guy in a cell and…"

"There she is," I interrupted, chucking him with my arm and pointing down the street. She was walking towards us, along with Bernard and Hayes.

"Oh, thank God," he said as he headed towards her.

"Sorry I'm late," she began, but he pulled her into a hug, stifling her words as he held her firmly against his chest.

"What happened?"

I turned around to find that Bobby, Alex and Carolyn had all come out of McNally's, too.

"It's fine," I said. "Lupo just thought she should've been here by now."

"It's our fault," Bernard spoke up. "We stopped off to hand over the file on Tyler Bradshaw just as she was leaving the office. We went back upstairs so that she could put the official charges into the system."

"So you walked over with them?" Lupo asked, finally having relaxed his hold on her.

"Yeah," she answered. "Mike was going to come with me, but when Bernard and Hayes showed up, he decided to put in another hour at the office. He was just coming so that I wouldn't be alone. You didn't get my text?"

"I need to get a new phone," he mumbled as he scrolled through the messages.

"We need to catch that stalker," I elaborated. "What's the latest?"

"You know what? I need a beer first. Let's go inside, and then I'll tell you all about it."

TBC...


	22. Chapter 22

**Alex POV**

* * *

><p>It's a good thing that I'm used to large family gatherings.<p>

Otherwise, I might've been a little shell-shocked by the myriad of conversations going on around the table.

But the eight of us were no competition for my family on Thanksgiving, so I was a pro at carrying on multiple conversations at once.

"You should've seen her," Hayes was saying to me. "She was standing there, practically naked…"

"She had on a bathrobe," Bernard interrupted with amusement.

"A bathrobe? You call that thing a bathrobe? It was lingerie," she told him, and then she looked at me again and said, "And she didn't even have it belted. I thought his eyes were going to pop out of his head."

"And I couldn't figure out why you wouldn't quit staring," he countered. He leaned closer to me and said, "She actually reached out, like she was going to touch her. I thought she'd lost her mind."

"I was doing my job," she reminded him. "You were just projecting some typical male fantasy about getting to see some girl on girl action."

Bernard laughed, and so did Bobby, who'd been quietly sitting next to me.

"She did ask for your phone number, Bernard," Bobby told him. "Maybe there's still a chance."

"Yeah, after she serves twenty-five to life for her part in two murders," Hayes retorted. "Unless you want to arrange a conjugal visit."

"I never said I was interested," he argued. "She's nowhere near my type."

"Nearly naked isn't your type?" I asked him with a smirk.

I was enjoying watching him squirm a little, and I liked that Hayes was teasing him about it.

It meant that she wasn't insecure about it.

Because someone like Amanda Evans could be damaging to a woman with confidence issues.

"I think I need another beer," he answered as he got up from the table.

"So things went smoothly with Tyler?" I asked Hayes after Bernard left.

"Oh yeah. Once we told him that Amanda had given him up, he cried like a baby and confessed to everything. Thank you, by the way. For handling the interrogation. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have been able to get her to talk. Not like you did."

"Probably not," I agreed. "But not for the reason you're thinking. She just wasn't intimidated by me. She seemed to think we were on the same level, as far as needing to use cunning to get a man instead of looks."

"So is that how Alex got you, Bobby? Did she sit around half-dressed while crossing and uncrossing her legs?" Lauren joked.

I thought Bobby was going to choke on his drink.

"Not exactly," he finally managed to say.

"Alex probably has," I heard Mike say.

"Alex has what?" I asked him.

"Do you know the song _I used to love her but I had to kill her_?"

"GN'R," I told him. "1988. Why?"

"See?" he said to Lupo with a grin. "She knows her rock."

"It was playing in a video that my stalker emailed around the office," Connie explained.

"So what do you think?" Lupo asked Logan. "The stalker is mid-forties?"

"Younger," Bobby said. "I'd say mid- to late-thirties."

"Why?" Hayes asked, having jumped into the conversation with us.

"If the song's important to the stalker, a good guess would be that it was popular during his impressionable years. Thirteen to sixteen," Carolyn explained. "If the song came out twenty-three years ago, that would put our guy in the thirty-six to thirty-nine range."

"Assuming it means something to him," Bernard added as he sat back down. "Maybe he just thought the title fit."

"I'd still guess the same age range," I said. "Maybe even a little younger. Stalkers generally stick to someone their own age. There are the random exceptions, but most of the time…"

"So what was in the video?" Bobby asked.

"Basic day to day stuff," Lupo answered. "And we know he's got access to her web cam, so…"

"It could've been a lot worse," Connie finished.

"Were you alone in the clips?" Mike asked.

"Yeah, I guess so. I mean, there are people in the background, but…"

"I wasn't with her," Lupo said with a nod. "He didn't use the sex tape because it ruins his fantasy."

"What did you get from the guy you had at the precinct?" I asked him.

"He's a creepy little pervert, but he's not our stalker. The WMV had been emailed to him. I wanted to get Mulder on the computer system today, but picking up Denny threw me off schedule. I'm going to go get him tomorrow, and see what he can find out."

"He might be able to get something telling from that video," Carolyn suggested.

"That's what we're hoping."

"So I guess I'm with you tomorrow, Lupes," Bernard said. "My first day back, and we're going to Secaucus?"

"What can I say? I wish I could get him employed with the NYPD, but for now, we're going to have to settle for kidnapping him and dragging him into the DA's office."

"What did Sean think of your guy?" I asked him. I hadn't talked to my brother in a few days, but I knew that he was enjoying working with Lupo. "And where is he?"

"Oh, he had to meet Alicia for the…the um…he um…" he began, and then he just stopped talking altogether.

"Meet Alicia for what?"

"I have no idea," he said vaguely. "So…where's the chief tonight? I told Eames I'd confirm that he and Hayes have to report to the 2-7 tomorrow, and I kind of figured he'd be here tonight."

I didn't push him on the topic of what was up with my brother, but it was obvious that he knew something I didn't.

But I did make a mental note to call Sean tomorrow.

"He and Liz are probably at home," Carolyn answered.

"Actually, they're not," I said as I watched the two people in question enter the bar.

"Did my invitation get lost in the mail?" Liz asked as she pulled up a chair.

"It's a standing invitation," Bobby told her, leaning over to kiss her on the cheek.

"How much catching up do we need to do?" Ross asked as he waved the waitress over to our table.

"Don't even try," Logan told him. "We're trained professionals."

"We haven't been here that long," Carolyn corrected. "And we've actually been talking about our cases, so I don't know…maybe we can send the department our tab?"

"Hey, I've come a long way, but I'm not quite there yet," Ross answered. "You still have to buy your own drinks."

"How about I buy yours in exchange for a favor?" Lupo suggested.

"You want to keep Eames as your partner? I don't blame you. I wouldn't want Bernard back, either," Liz joked.

"Come on, Doc. That hurts," Bernard said.

"Actually, I want Bernard _and_ Eames. And Hayes. And I want to hire my guy as a subcontractor for the duration of this case. So far, he's been working for free, but Chief…he's good. And he's getting the job done. He'd be a good resource for Major Case."

"Anything else?" Ross asked drolly. "A new SUV? Maybe a timeshare in Florida?"

"Two days, Chief," he said, pleading his case. "And I'll call Loo myself and get her blessing, too. Then Eames and Hayes can go back to the 2-7 on Monday."

"Hang on," Ross said as the waitress reappeared at the table with a tray full of drinks. He waited while she passed them out, and then he picked up his glass and drained half of it.

"Okay," he said at last. "But close it, okay? Find the stalker, get your guy to clean up the DA's system, and wrap it up."

"So…two more days as a Major Case detective," Hayes said.

"Right. So no sleeping together until Monday," Logan told her, waggling his finger back and forth between her and Bernard.

The look on her face was priceless, and I couldn't keep from laughing. I felt slightly bad that she was getting the brunt of his teasing, but I was glad to see that his mood had lightened considerably since we'd first arrived at the bar.

I knew he was having trouble, and so was Carolyn. That was why I'd forced her to be honest with him when he'd asked her about Olivet.

He needed to know that his feelings of jealousy were normal, and that she felt the same way. She seemed to think that by holding back, she was protecting him, but she wasn't.

She was an awful lot like Bobby in that respect.

It had taken me awhile to break him of the habit of keeping things inside.

I leaned a little closer to him as the conversation continued to ebb and flow. I couldn't hold his hand, since I was still wearing this damn sling, but as I shifted towards him, he put his arm around my shoulders, pulling me even closer.

"Oh, Carolyn," Liz said. "I won't be able to look at those lab reports until Friday. We're going to Baltimore tomorrow."

"Yeah, Alex told me. That's fine. And honestly, I don't know that there'll be anything of substance in there, but I'll feel better after you go over it."

"No problem."

"Chief, we talked to Jeremy this afternoon," Bobby said to Ross. "And we think that maybe you should call Dr. Skoda and set up an appointment."

"You think he needs to see a shrink?"

"No," I assured him. "But Carolyn suggested that maybe some of his memories are repressed as a response to shock. We're thinking hypnosis therapy might help him."

"Not a bad idea," he said, nodding thoughtfully. "I'll discuss it with Jeremy tomorrow. So, Skoda's the best? Better than Olivet?"

"Yes," was the overwhelming response, spoken by at least four of us at the table.

"Okay," he said slowly. "Skoda it is."

"Are you ready to go?" Bobby said softly, whispering into my ear.

"I'm with you," I answered easily.

I turned and met his gaze and found him staring at me intently…proprietarily…almost hungrily.

I wasn't sure what was going through his mind, but…no, actually I knew _exactly_ what was going through his mind.

I just wasn't sure what had prompted it.

And at the moment, I didn't care.

Because when he looked at me like that, all I wanted to do was find the nearest available hard surface. And considering the closest one was a table surrounded by eight of our closest friends, it would probably be a better idea if we went home.

"We're going to call it a night," I said as I got up from my chair.

My announcement started a chorus of objections, which was followed by a series of hand-shaking and hugs.

This was a family thanksgiving all over again. It almost took longer to _leave_ than it did to stay.

"Can I talk to you about something?" Hayes said quietly to me while Bobby pulled some cash from his wallet to cover our portion of the bill.

Bernard was engaged in a conversation with Connie, and I could only guess that she'd chosen that moment to ask me because he wasn't paying attention.

"Not right now," she added. "But soon."

"Okay," I agreed curiously. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah. Everything's great. I just…I want to get your opinion on something."

"Walk me outside," I said, tipping my head towards the door.

"It can wait."

"Come on," I insisted, and then I turned and put my hand on Bobby's arm as I went up on my toes so that I could whisper into his ear. "Give me five minutes."

I grabbed my coat and headed for the door, with Hayes right on my heels.

Once we were outside, I realized that she was extremely uneasy.

"What is it?" I asked her.

"I wasn't ready to talk yet," she admitted. "I only asked you so that I wouldn't chicken out later."

"Whatever it is, just say it," I encouraged. "You'll feel better after getting it off your chest."

"Maybe," she conceded, but she continued to look at the ground, nervously scraping the sidewalk with the toe of her boot. I stayed quiet and she finally looked up at me. "You tell Bobby everything, right?"

"Most everything. But I won't repeat what you tell me if you ask me not to."

"I don't mean that. I'm just…how soon did you start telling him everything? Right from the beginning? I mean, I haven't had any kind of serious relationship since college, and I really don't want to mess things up with Bernard, but…"

"But there's something from your past that you think he should know," I finished, finally catching on to where she was going.

"You're very perceptive," she said with a smile. "I'm not used to having friends who know what I'm thinking before I do. Actually, I'm not used to having women friends at all."

"You know what's going on with Mike and Carolyn right now," I stated.

"Yeah, that's kind of what got me thinking about it."

"And your advice to her was to tell him, right? Because the past was just that."

"Yeah, but…this is different. Bernard's not in love with me. I'm hoping that one day he might be, but…what if I tell him and then he doesn't stick around?"

"You think it's so bad that he'd walk away?"

"Everyone else did. That's kind of why I haven't had a serious relationship since college," she replied. "But I like Bernard…a lot, and I don't want things to progress and then I'm even more invested in the relationship…because then he might feel like I was intentionally keeping this from him. And then when he leaves, it'll hurt that much more."

"Lauren, maybe you're not giving him enough credit," I said gently. "And no matter what it is, if you tell him and he _does_ walk away, then you're better off. If he can't appreciate you for who you are, in spite of your past, then maybe he's not the guy for you."

She held my gaze for a moment, and then dropped her eyes back to the ground and nodded her head.

"And since it's bothering you this much, you have to know that he's picked up on something," I continued. "We're perceptive, remember?"

She looked up at me again and smiled.

"Yeah, I don't know how you guys all stand each other," she joked. "Okay, so…I should tell him."

"I think so," I said with a nod. I looked through the front windows of the bar and saw that Bobby was coming towards us. Impeccable timing, as usual.

"Okay. Thanks, Alex. I really appreciate the advice," she said, and then she smirked and added, "And I'm sorry to hold you two up. I know Bobby's a little…anxious to get home."

I raised my eyebrow at her in question, and she said, "Hey, I have my moments of perceptiveness, too."

"Are we ready?" Bobby asked as he joined us outside.

"Yeah," I answered as he put his arm around me. I looked at Hayes and said, "You'll be fine. He's a smart man."

She nodded thoughtfully and then said goodbye and went back into the bar.

"She and Bernard are having trouble already?"

"Oh, you know. It's that whole thing of when to tell what. When you meet someone new at our age, there are just so many skeletons…it's hard to know when to pull one out."

"You've got skeletons?" he asked lightly as we headed for the subway station.

"Why do you think I never want you to look in that hall closet?" I teased.

He laughed for a moment, but then fell quiet, so I waited patiently, knowing that he had something on his mind.

"Did you and Joe ever…you know…take pictures?"

I should've known that when Mike sent me and Carolyn to the bar for drinks that it was because he wanted to talk to Bobby about those pictures.

"Never mind," he said quickly, before I could speak. "It doesn't matter."

"No," I said, answering anyway. "The only dirty pictures that exist of me are the ones Ethan Garrett took of the two of us last fall."

"That you know of," he clarified. "Because Carolyn probably would've said the same thing last week at this time."

"That's true," I agreed. "What about you?"

"Me? No."

"Are you sure?"

"Well…as sure as I can be, I guess. Same as you."

"So that's what's on your mind? Mike asked you how you would handle the situation if you were in his shoes, and so now you can't stop thinking about it."

"Maybe. Yeah."

This was one of those times when it wasn't such a good thing that Bobby had such a wonderfully vivid imagination.

He was probably visualizing me and Joe together in scenarios that had never even existed.

"So let's go home…and look at _our_ pictures…and see if we can recreate the moment."

TBC...

A/N: Okay, since it IS my birthday, I really think everyone should hit that review button...and if I'm properly motivated, maybe I'll throw another chapter up today :)


	23. Chapter 23

**A/N: Thanks for the reviews - I wish it was my birthday every day! **

**As promised...**

**Bobby POV**

* * *

><p>"You know, I knew that he had it bad, but this…"<p>

"I can't believe he wasn't pulled from the home."

"Did you know about all of this?"

"I think my knowledge only barely scratched the surface," I admitted.

Alex and I had spent the past hour reviewing the case file of Shannon Logan.

It was Thursday morning, and we were dressed and ready to go to 1PP, but we'd decided to go over the documentation at home instead of running the risk of anyone else glancing at it while in the squad room.

I'd planned to look at the file last night, but after our personal x-rated slideshow, let's just say that nothing was on my mind except Alex.

But after enjoying each other for several hours last night, we'd gotten some sleep and then awakened early so that we'd have time to go over the file.

"I'm betting that Social Services had no idea what was going on. Otherwise, they would've never let him stay there," Alex remarked as she flipped back to the section that contained a lengthy witness statement from Shannon's hospice nurse.

The nurse had apparently kept a detailed journal, and then she'd relayed to the police several of the conversations that she had with Logan's mother during her final months.

"Look at this," Alex continued, pointing to a specific paragraph as she read aloud. "_I should've killed the little bastard. One time I thought I actually did. I hit him with a skillet. I think he was…I don't know...maybe nine. But he didn't cry, so I hit him a few more times. I mean, what kind of kid doesn't cry? Even when he was on the floor, with blood coming out of his ears…still nothing. There was something wrong with that boy_."

"It almost makes me grateful that my mother only had schizophrenia," I said quietly.

"Bobby…"

"No, I'm serious," I continued. "She was bad sometimes, but this…"

"Well, I can see why the police questioned him," Alex said. "If she was my mother, I certainly would've killed her."

"But there's no evidence of murder," I remarked. "She had Hepatitis C, cirrhosis, hepatorenal syndrome…it's a miracle she lived as long as she did."

"So what would make the ME initially say that the cause was undetermined?"

"Maybe the nurse was suspicious of Mike? I mean, she's pretty thorough with her recount of Shannon's horrible stories. Look at this one," I said.

I reached over and flipped to the next page in the file, even though I didn't need to look at the words because they were already burned onto my brain.

"_It got to the point where I had to see what it would take to make him cry. Beating him just didn't work, no matter how hard I tried. He'd just look at me with his father's eyes, and that would only piss me off even more."_

"So you think the nurse shared her thoughts with the cops, and so they got the ME to say undetermined just to give them time to investigate?"

"It happens," I said with a shrug.

"Yeah, but even after they investigated, they cleared Mike. He had a rock solid alibi, and there was no evidence to support that she died of anything other than natural causes. So what could Jack possibly think that he has on him?"

"Maybe he just wants to humiliate him by bringing these reports to light. He had to know that Carolyn would look it up. She'd read this stuff, or that Mike himself would read it. I mean, look at this Alex."

I turned another page and read aloud.

"_One day when he was twelve, he came home crying. I couldn't believe it. I asked him what the fuck had happened to make him cry. Not because I cared, but because I just had to know, you know? _And the nurse asked, _did he tell you what had happened?_ And Shannon said, _he made up some bullshit story about our priest. Our priest, for God's sake, can you believe it? I told him to shut his filthy mouth and that I never wanted to hear another word about it._ The nurse asked, _his priest molested him?_ Shannon answered, _that's what he said, but he was a fucking liar, just like his father."_

"And did you see the next one?" Alex asked, her voice telling me that she was feeling the same thing as me.

Like she wanted to throw up.

"_I kept thinking about it, though. I mean, one time I'd even broken his arm with an iron poker and he still wouldn't cry. So I decided to test him_," Alex read. "O_ne night, I sent one of my boyfriends into his room. I figured, hell, if the priest really made him cry, then this guy could do it, too._ The nurse asked, _so what happened?_ Shannon replied (laughing), _the little bastard had a baseball bat in the bed with him! Can you believe that? He knocked the shit out of the guy and told him that if he ever came into his room again, he'd kill him._"

She finished reading and the two of us continued to sit at the table in silence.

"I think that's exactly it," she said at last. "There's nothing in here. There's no evidence that Mike ever even saw his mother during the last six months of her life. There's no way he did anything to her. Jack just wanted him to relive it. He told Carolyn he wanted to ruin her life, so making Mike go through this again is just one part of his plan."

"Because Jack already thinks that Mike's unstable," I added with a nod. "He probably figures it wouldn't take much to push him over the edge. And honestly, if you didn't know Mike and you'd only read this file, what would you think?"

"That he probably grew up to be an abuser," she stated. "Or at the very least, he has the potential to be one."

"Well," I replied softly as I closed the file. "He doesn't know Mike very well, does he?"

"No," she agreed, getting up from the table. "But I'll tell you something. I'm not letting this go until Jack's in prison."

She angrily jerked on her coat, struggling one-handed to get it on, so I quickly stepped over to her and put my hands on her shoulders to settle her down, and then I eased the jacket onto her good arm and pulled the rest of it into place.

"Hey," I whispered soothingly, as I pulled her hair from beneath her collar.

"I'm fine," she answered, turning around and looking at me with emotion-filled eyes. "It's just…what kind of woman treats a child like that? I wonder if John knows just how lucky he is that she left him. And Mike…I'm not even sure what to say to him. I mean, does he know that all of that stuff was in the file?"

"My guess is no, but I'm really glad he asked us to look at it."

"You are?"

"As opposed to him looking at it?" I reminded her.

"You're right," she said on a sigh. "I just…I don't know how he turned out so great. I'm going to have to hug him as soon as I see him."

And she did.

I wanted to, but I didn't because I didn't want him thinking that I now felt sorry for him or that I was going to look at him differently.

I mean, Alex hugs him from time to time, so it wasn't that big of a deal for her to do it, but if I'd done it…

"We think that Jack's purpose for bringing up your mother's death was simply to make you relive it," I explained to Mike.

The four of us were in the break room at 1PP stocking up on coffee.

"That's it? Are you sure?" Mike asked.

"There's nothing in there that seems remotely damning," Alex explained. "We think that your mother's nurse triggered the investigation, but it was put to bed quickly for a reason. It's completely unwarranted."

"That seems like a stretch, don't you think?" Carolyn questioned worriedly. "He just wanted Mike to read the file?"

"Or you," I told her with a nod.

Mike took an extra moment to stir his coffee, watching the black liquid swirling in the cup and then he finally brought his eyes up to mine.

"It's that bad?"

"It's…" I began, and then I trailed off, unsure of exactly how to say it.

"Your mother shared memories with her nurse," Alex filled in.

"The nurse who expressed concern to the cops?"

"Right. She made a ten-page statement, complete with a recount of some of those stories."

"Oh," he responded quietly. "Okay, so…okay. Well, I appreciate you guys taking care of that for me."

"Detective Goren?"

Alex and I both looked toward the doorway where an officer stood holding a few pieces of paper.

"Yes?" Alex asked when he continued to stand there.

"Oh, I think it's the other…"

"It doesn't matter," I said as Alex walked over to him and took the papers from him.

"Thanks," she said with a fake smile. She glanced at it and then looked up at me. "The ME's report on Eva Dwyer."

"Is that your Fort Bragg victim?" Carolyn asked with interest.

"Uh huh. It looks like Miss Dwyer put up a hell of a fight. Bruising on her forearms, broken fingernails…"

"Which would explain why he used antifreeze this time," I said with a nod. "Like you said, Carolyn. The antifreeze in her system would make her much more compliant for him to finish out his plan."

"You said this guy had motive?" Mike remarked, and I was glad to see that he was engaging in the conversation.

He'd been avoiding eye contact for the past several minutes. I could just imagine that he was now rehashing his youth, wondering what stories his mother had shared that now Alex and I were privy to.

"Friends of our current victim say that she was getting ready to leave him because he was abusive," I explained.

"What about you two?" Alex asked as she handed me the faxed report so that she could pick up her coffee cup. "You're going to pick up your suspect?"

"Yeah, I'm hoping that if we get him in the box, he'll crack," Mike said.

"And speaking of," Carolyn said, looking at her watch. "We'd better go. He's due at his office in an hour, and I'd like to be there waiting for him."

The two of them left and Alex and I went out to our desks.

"Why do I feel like I just read my little sister's diary or something?" Alex asked as she sat down.

"Because we both know that file had more in it than he suspected. And now he has to wonder what we think of him."

"We're taking them out tonight," she said firmly. "Just the four of us. I don't want any lingering unease between us."

"We'll do it at our place," I suggested. "That way we'll have some privacy."

With the decision made, we both got to work trying to track down a possible location of our suspect, Jim Randall.

"He's not using his credit card," Alex said after several minutes. "But look at this. He made a cash withdrawal at a bank in Lyndhurst yesterday afternoon."

"How much?"

"Five hundred."

"Do we know any of his old army buddies? Someone who might put him up?" I asked, walking around her desk so that I could read over her shoulder as she went back through the case file that we'd pulled yesterday.

"Sgt. Delfina Moreno," she said after a moment. "He made a statement on his friend's behalf, offering him an alibi that never fully checked out."

"And where is Sgt. Moreno now?" I asked with interest.

She plugged his name into a search engine and after a few minutes, we had our answer.

"He's on recruiting duty in Bloomfield," she said.

"Isn't Lyndhurst on the way to Bloomfield?"

"It is," she said with a nod.

"A road trip to the Garden State," I mused as I walked back around to grab my coat. "You and me, alone in the car for a couple of hours…back in the old days, I would've been excited by that prospect."

"Why is that?" she asked with a smile as we walked to the elevator.

"Because I had you all to myself."

"And now?"

I pushed the button and waited until we were on the elevator and heading down before I leaned down to whisper my response.

"It makes me even more excited."

TBC...


	24. Chapter 24

**Lupo POV**

* * *

><p>"Labyrinth. Can you say disambiguation? I mean, come on, man. Shit."<p>

I glanced over at Mulder where he was mumbling and working furiously at Cutter's computer, and he looked up at me quickly before shifting his eyes over to Cutter.

"Oh. Sorry. Sir. I mean, Mr. Cutter, sir."

"You can curse in here if you want to," Cutter said with barely-masked amusement. "It's happened once or twice."

"I just…this is…dude."

"Seriously crazy shit?" I offered.

"Lupo, _dude_. You're the man. You _know_, right?"

"Tell me what I know," I told him. "Because other than it being crazy, I have no idea."

"Okay, well, check it."

He paused when I held up my hand, and I looked at Cutter and said, "Don't worry about following what he's saying. I'll translate when he's done."

"Translate?" Mulder questioned. "Come on, dude. Shit, I'm speaking English."

"You can speak Swahili if you've figured out where our guy is working from, so just lay it on me."

"Okay, so the video…it was shot using a Blackberry Bold 9000."

"How can you…" Cutter began, but I coughed and shook my head.

I honestly didn't care how Mulder knew, and it was best not to interrupt him once he got going.

"Yeah, right," Mulder said with a nod, although I don't know to what he was showing approval. "And the program? It's old school shit. It almost pulled the major sheep, you know? But then I was like shit, man. I mean, it's so freaking pre-K, it's genius. I'm talking virtuosity, man."

I glanced over at Cutter who was sitting slack-jawed, staring at Mulder, and it was all I could do not to laugh. It was a lot more amusing listening to Mulder confuse someone other than me.

Although, I was somewhat lost, too, but I was starting to get the hang of his jargon.

"The program he used to create the WMV?" I clarified as I moved around behind him so that I could see what he was up to. Cutter came around the desk, too.

"Yahtzee, man. I mean, shit. It's not on Amazon, you know what I'm saying? And your girl here," he continued. "Who, by the way, Lupo is _smoking_. Damn, man, you didn't tell me you'd snagged a stone cold fox. Shit, dude, the girl is slammin', right? You must be packin' some serious shit to bag a chica like that. I mean, come on, man. Giddy up."

"Mulder. The video," I said as I snapped my fingers and pointed at the monitor.

"Yeah. Dude. Sorry. She's just…damn. Okay, so check it. Right here," he said, pausing the video and pointing at the screen. "Watch when I play it. It shakes a little, right? And the line of sight moves. The dude is walking, right?"

"Yeah, so?"

"So check the angle, Lupo. Come on, man, shit."

"He's short," I said with a nod. "Or at least, shorter than Connie."

"You're feeling me, Lupo," he said, looking over his shoulder at me. Then he grinned and said, "So where's the ten, man? I can get you down to the last inch."

"But how can you…" Cutter began, and then he caught himself and closed his mouth.

"She's in court," I told Mulder. "But she's five-nine."

He whistled and nodded his head as he reran the video again.

"Yeah, but dude…what about the heels?" he asked after a moment. Connie's feet weren't visible in the video.

"I don't know. Two, maybe three inches."

"Dude, you got a woman like that and you don't know her shoes?"

"I know her shoes," I insisted defensively.

"So which is it? Two or three?"

"Two," I answered.

"Okay, 'cos dude, check it. In this shot right here…" he said as he paused the video again. "Five-seven. Are you feeling me? Shit, man. Your guy really screwed the pooch when he pieced this vid, right? What's his damage?"

"He's obsessed," I answered with a shrug. "He's escalating."

"Man, I can feel him on that, right? I mean she's…damn."

"So you said," I retorted. "So what do we know? Our guy is five-seven, and when we catch him, he'll have a Blackberry in his pocket and an outdated video-maker on his computer."

I wasn't going to knock it.

It was way more than we had when we'd arrived at the DA's office three hours ago.

It had taken more than a little bit of convincing to get Mulder to come into the city.

_"Dude, I don't function outside the crib, right?"_ he'd said with slight panic in his voice.

_"I got approval to put you on the books,"_ I told him. "_You'll get paid for today. And door to door taxi service. It doesn't get any better than that, does it?"_

_"You put me on the books? Where? What kind of books? Shit, Lupo, I don't want my name out there!"_

_"Out where? Who's going to see it?"_

_"That's just it, man. You don't know."_

_"Okay, relax. I haven't put it anywhere yet. If you don't want…"_

_"I don't want," _he interrupted. "_You think I do this shit for the greenage, man?"_

_"I don't know why you do it."_

_"Because it's cool as shit. I'm talking Jason Bourne, man. You're like a real life John McClane, right?"_

_"The guy from Die Hard?"_ I'd asked in amusement.

_"If I didn't do what I do, I'd want to do what you do, right? It's some seriously intense shit."_

_"You think what we've done so far is intense? Come into the city with me. The EADA is going to let you work out of his office. And you should see the shit that goes on in that place. He's going to let you walk through his system," _I said persuasively.

_"Can I sit at his desk?"_ he asked after a moment.

_"Absolutely."_

_"And you'll buy me lunch?"_

_"Of course."_

_"Okay. But I don't want any money, right? Just let me work my voodoo on that shit, okay, man?"_

So that was our bargain. I got Cutter to work from an extra laptop on a side table so that Mulder could sit at the main desk, and I promised to bring in Gray's Papaya for lunch.

Eames was currently out picking up the promised lunch while Bernard and Hayes continued to plow through the security footage. In a building this size, with as many cameras as it had, that was no small task.

"I gotcha more than that, man. Check it," Mulder said in response to my summary. "The vid went out at eleven-fifteen, right? Real time."

"From here?" Cutter asked him.

"DA IP, man. I mean, sir," he corrected. "So Lupo, dude…that's your in, right? I got you two firm ticks, man. Give me another few and I'll get the third."

I stared at him blankly, thinking how exhausting it was to carry on a conversation with this twenty-something year old genius, and then it clicked.

"Two ticks," I repeated, looking over at Cutter. He was still clueless, so I said, "We know the exact time that two emails were sent from somewhere in this building."

"And hang on, dude," Mulder said as his fingers flew over the keyboard. "Hang on just another…gotcha, poser. Seven twenty-five, but check it. He blazed it, right?"

"So when was it really sent?"

"Five-thirteen the day before. So there you go, dude. Triangulate that shit, man, and get out your yard stick," he said as he pushed back from the desk.

Cutter and I both stepped out of the way as Mulder spun around in the chair to face us. He leaned back in the expensive leather chair and smiled at us as he began cracking his knuckles.

"Can you get your security department on it?" I asked Cutter. "We need stills of everyone using their computer at those three exact times."

"It should be a simple script, right?" Mulder spoke up. "Romper room shit, man. I mean, your footage is digitized, right?"

"Yeah," Cutter answered.

"I'll hook you up, man. Give me five."

He spun back around to the computer and started working, so Cutter and I went back to the other side of the room where we'd been going through the entry and exit logs for the building.

"You actually understand what that guy's saying?"

"Enough. And you have to admit it. He's good."

"Yes, he is," he said with a nod. "I might have to call him again some time. So he's going to debug our system after he finishes…whatever he's working on now, right?"

"Oh yeah. He'll have you guys squeaking by the end of the day."

"You're starting to sound like him," he said with a smirk.

"Dude, it's your hottie," Mulder said loudly, and I turned to see Connie crossing the exterior office, heading for Cutter's door.

"Behave yourself," I told him as I moved toward the doorway to meet her. I glanced behind her, but she appeared to be alone.

"You were supposed to call me when you were done," I said to her. "You didn't walk over her alone, did you?"

"Carl was with me," she said.

"Carl?"

"My second chair for the Madsen case."

"So where is he?"

"He didn't come in," she explained. "He had to run an errand, but he said that he didn't mind making a detour by the office first. He's okay, Lupo."

"How tall is he?"

"How tall? Um…I don't know. My height."

"Dude, man, you're leaving me hanging," Mulder said as he came up behind me.

"Sorry. Connie, meet Mulder."

"The vid was bunk, man," he said to me, even though his eyes stayed on Connie. "Not ten…more like twelve, man. Shit."

Connie looked at me in confusion, but I just moved Mulder out of the way and walked with her out into the outer office.

"He thinks you're cute," I explained. "But fortunately, he was able to focus long enough to get us some good, solid leads. We're closing in on him."

"Good," she replied emphatically. "I'll be glad when this is done."

"Me, too."

"Hey, Lupo," Mulder said as he came into the outer office. He held out a data stick to me and instructed, "Slip this to the desk jockeys, right? It's good to go, just run it. It might take a couple of hours, but it'll get your clips."

"Want to walk with me down to security?" I asked Connie.

"Sure," she agreed. "Just give me a second."

She stuck her head into Cutter's office to give him an update on the motion she'd handled this morning in court.

"Lunch should be here any minute," I told Mulder. "Why don't you get started looking through the system and see if you can shore it up, and then we'll eat."

"Yeah, dude, sure," he agreed. He turned to go back into the office, and then he stopped and looked at me with a big smile on his face. "Dude, this shit rocks, man. Yippy ki-aye."

Five minutes later, Connie and I took the stairwell to go down to the first floor.

"That guy makes me feel old," I admitted to her.

"He looks up to you," she stated. "You're his hero."

"Well, there's not a lot of competition. He doesn't socialize at all. He's got it in his head that I'm like John McClane."

"From Die Hard?" she asked with a smile.

"I know. Go ahead and laugh."

"I'm not laughing. But he's wrong," she said, leaning into me a little and then she lowered her voice and added, "You're way sexier than Bruce Willis."

TBC...


	25. Chapter 25

**Carolyn POV**

* * *

><p>"Are you okay?"<p>

"You mean, does it bother me that our best friends know some of the things my mother did to me? That they might even know about what happened with…you know…"

"They knew some of it anyway," I said calmly. "And it's not like they'd ever judge you for anything that happened."

"I know, but…" He trailed off his argument and instead let out a heavy sigh. "You're right. It doesn't matter."

"I'm not saying it doesn't matter. I'm just saying that I'm glad it was them who read it and not you. And whatever was in that file, it won't change what they think about you. They both love you – you know that."

"Yeah. You know, I never considered the possibility that my mother had confided in Helen," he said, still looking out the window as I drove us uptown to the office building of our suspect, Victor Ashe. "She wasn't exactly a social butterfly."

"Maybe she wanted some kind of absolution," I suggested. "Maybe she recognized how wrong she'd been, and since she was facing certain death, she used Helen as a kind of confessor."

"You think she was seeking forgiveness?" he asked, turning to look at me. "That she felt remorse for the things she'd done?"

I glanced at his face, doing a quick assessment of his mental state. He didn't look as bad as I'd expected. And at least he was talking.

So that made me want to lie.

But I just couldn't. I'd promised myself that I'd never lie to him again.

"No," I answered quietly. "No, I don't. I think that for whatever reason, she didn't see anything wrong with her actions. She was sick, Mike. A long time before she was ever diagnosed with a disease."

He continued to stare at me as I drove through the congested streets. I could feel his gaze even though I couldn't look at him.

"Thank you," he said after a minute.

"You're going to thank me? It's my fault this whole thing was brought out of the closet."

"No, it's not. It's Jack's. But I'm thanking you for being honest," he said, reaching over to take hold of my hand.

My phone buzzed with an incoming text, a sound that now instilled fear in me because it was most likely Jack.

"Don't get it," I said when Mike went to reach for it.

"You know what? This asshole thinks he's going to come between us, but the joke's on him. I feel closer to you than ever, and nothing, not even some damn picture, is going to ever make me love you less, okay?"

He picked up my phone from the cup holder, but just held it in his hand until I nodded my approval.

"Okay," I agreed reluctantly. "Just…if it's…"

"No secrets," he said, leaning over to kiss my cheek. "About anything. This guy's declared war on us, so we both need to have all of the intel we can in order to fight back, okay? You're making yourself sick, worrying about what he's going to do next, or whether or not I'm going to see one of those pictures. You don't need to do that."

"You're feeling awfully…confident," I said as I brought the car to a stop at a red light.

I turned to look at him, as he still held my phone in his hand. He hadn't checked the message yet.

"Yeah. I am," he agreed with a smile. "What'dya know?"

He held the phone out to me and added, "We're at a light. Go ahead."

"No," I said, with a rush of fear and apprehension. "You check it."

I didn't breathe as he opened my phone and clicked on the message.

"He wants to meet you tonight," he said and then he rattled off the meeting details. "He says he'll let you know what you need to do if you want to protect me."

"That's it? No picture?"

"Oh, there's a picture," he said quietly, and I glanced at him as he continued to stare at the phone's display.

"Mike…"

He snapped it shut and then moved quickly across the car, sliding his hand over my thigh as he pressed another kiss against my cheek.

"I'm glad I looked."

"You are?"

"You were gorgeous back then," he said, his voice low and husky, bordering on a whisper. "But that image doesn't hold a candle to what you are now. And you know what seeing that does to me?"

"I'm…almost afraid to ask."

"Looking at your face…it shows me the difference," he said simply. "You didn't love him, at least not like you love me."

"You thought that I did?" I asked, praying for another red light so that I could stop the car. As it was, I kept glancing back and forth between him and the road.

"Maybe. I mean, yeah, I figured you loved him. He was married and you wanted him enough for that not to matter."

"I was young and stupid," I answered. "And my reasons for wanting him had a lot more to do with me than him. It was never about love."

"It's okay if it was. I can't expect that you've never loved anyone."

Finally, a red light.

I stopped the car, rather abruptly so as to make the most of the time.

"I haven't," I said emphatically. "Just you."

I brought my mouth to his, kissing him hard in an effort to convey my conviction.

I hadn't loved anyone. In fact, for a long time, I just assumed that I was incapable. That it was an emotion that had been somehow skipped over during my creation.

But now I knew that wasn't true.

And for the first time in nearly a week, I felt like I could comfortably breathe.

"So…you're okay?" I asked him hesitantly once I began driving again.

"After seeing the picture?" he asked. I nodded, and he continued, "It's not something I'm going to print off and carry around in my wallet, but…yeah. Like I said, it's actually better now that I've seen it."

"And the meeting tonight? Are we both going to go?"

"I'm thinking we'll just mike you up," he countered. "And I'll be nearby. That way, he'll still believe that he's getting to us. We'll find out what he's up to and then we'll take him down."

Twenty minutes later, we walked into the lobby of Victor Ashe's place of business, and I felt a renewed sense of confidence.

"So what do you feel like doing today?" Mike asked under his breath to me as we went towards the elevators. "Good cop?"

"Uh uh. I want to be the bad cop," I told him as I flashed him a smile.

"You know he's going to be a jerk, right?"

"I'm sure," I agreed.

Our suspect was a number cruncher for a brokerage house. He had more letters after his name than a fish has scales and in my experience, people like that tended to look down on cops.

Especially when said cops were coming onto his turf to interrogate him for murder.

I usually enjoyed being the quiet, understated one, but I thought that in this situation, the guy would peg Mike as competition.

According to the DMV records, Victor was well over six feet tall and nearing two hundred and fifty pounds. He'd have a slight size advantage on Mike, and I could only imagine that he'd want to play up to that.

So considering what we knew, I thought it might work better to let Mike be the nice one.

That way the threat would come at him from an unexpected direction.

And of course, there was also another reason why I wanted to let him be the good cop.

Because I kind of felt like being a badass bitch.

Besides, it would give me practice for my meeting tonight with Jack.

"Can I help you?" a twenty-something secretary greeted as soon as we stepped off the elevator.

She was painted to the hilt and she'd immediately zeroed in on Mike, so I held back slightly in order to let him work his magic.

"We're here to see Victor Ashe," he told her, flashing her a charming smile.

"Do you have an appointment?" she asked, looking skeptically at me.

Her blatant evaluation annoyed me, so I pulled my badge and held it up, closer to her face than was necessary.

"Yes, as a matter of fact we do."

She was unimpressed with my display of hardware, but she smiled again at Mike and said, "He's not in yet, but you can wait. So you're a detective?"

"That's right, Karen," he answered, reading the placard on her desk. "Major Case."

"That sounds…fascinating."

"Oh, it is," I said, moving slightly closer to Mike. "We get to arrest murderers and their accomplices. It's a lot of fun. So tell me, Karen. When my partner called yesterday and asked the whereabouts of your boss…did you report that back to him?"

"That was you on the phone?" she asked Mike with interest.

"Hey," I said sharply in an effort to recapture her attention. Mike wandered away from her desk, looking down a hallway that contained a number of closed office doors.

"Did you tell Victor that we'd asked about him?" I repeated.

"No," she answered. "He was in Boston. I don't interrupt when he's out of town."

"Because you know…if you tipped him off…"

"I didn't," she insisted, and she finally looked like maybe I'd intimidated her.

Damn, I was losing my edge. It had taken me almost five minutes.

"So he should be here in…"

"Ten minutes, at the most," she said. "Do you two want to wait in his office?"

"Not if you're going to give him a heads-up as soon as he steps off that elevator."

"I won't," she promised.

"Okay," I agreed cautiously. "Because if you do, I'll take you in for aiding and abetting. You know what that means, right? Handcuffs…lock-up…"

"I get it."

"And you can forget any twisted fantasy you might have about my partner being the one to slap on the cuffs, okay? It'll be me, and I won't be nice."

I turned away from her and met Mike where he was standing halfway down the hall in front of a door labeled with Victor's name.

"Handcuff fantasy?" he questioned in a low tone.

"Okay, so maybe that was _my_ fantasy," I admitted as we went into Victor's office.

He barked out a laugh and closed the door behind us.

"I need to let you be the bad cop more often."

"You do, actually, because I'm a little rusty."

"You were great. And that was just the warm-up. Lay it on with Victor so we can put this case to bed."

I gave him a nod as I wandered aimlessly around the office.

"Oh, and that fantasy…" he continued. "I'll take care of that a little later, okay?"

I looked over my shoulder to find him giving me a smoldering gaze that nearly made me forget we had a job to do.

I don't know how the events of this morning had helped to turn his confidence around, but they most definitely had.

Maybe it was the acceptance of Bobby and Alex concerning the abuse Mike had suffered at the hands of his mother.

They'd always known about it, but only in generalities. Now they knew details and yet they'd shown nothing but support for Mike this morning.

Maybe that had helped him to realize, even more so than before, that none of what happened was his fault.

He was an innocent victim, to both his mother and his priest.

Or maybe it was that we were dealing with Jack, now completely together.

He'd seen one of the pictures.

And he'd been okay with it.

It made me wonder what kind of image he'd conjured up in his mind, considering that actually seeing the photo almost seemed like a relief. It wasn't as bad in reality as it was in his imagination.

And he'd been able to look at it objectively.

He'd noticed the look on my _face_.

That said volumes about his maturity and about our relationship.

So maybe it was one or the other, or a combination of both of those crucial events that had occurred this morning.

But whatever it was, it had worked.

His eyes walked over me in a slow, deliberate manner that had me holding my breath, waiting to see what he might do or say next.

And my reaction was crazy since we were presently working, but still…

The man was on fire.

Unfortunately, my response was curtailed by the opening of the office door.

"Victor Ashe," I stated as I walked towards him, holding up my badge. "Detectives Logan and Logan with Major Case. We need a few minutes of your time."

TBC...


	26. Chapter 26

**Hayes POV**

* * *

><p>I knew that Alex was right.<p>

I needed to come clean with Bernard.

But I didn't do it last night.

I probably should have because now that I was thinking about it again, I was also dreaming about it.

Again.

I thought I'd put it all behind me, but just the idea of opening up to Bernard was sending me back in time.

Probably because I'd never properly dealt with it the first time around, but I didn't want to deal with it now either.

I just wanted to pretend like it had never happened. I wanted to pretend like there was nothing wrong with me.

But of course, I'm too practical for that.

It _did_ happen and I _did_ need to deal with it because there _was_ something wrong with me.

But when we left McNally's Wednesday night, Bernard was in an amorous and playful mood, and I didn't want to ruin it.

So I procrastinated.

But then only a few hours after falling asleep in his arms, I found myself fully ensconced in my old nightmare.

I'd awakened in a cold sweat. My heart was pounding and I couldn't catch my breath. Tears streamed down my face.

I wasn't sure if my scream had only been in my head or if it had been out loud, but as I slowly became aware of my surroundings, I decided that it must have just been in my head because Bernard was still sleeping.

I got up from the bed and went into the kitchen so that I could get some water for my parched throat.

My nose was running and my face felt hot and I struggled to recapture my usual poise and self-control.

I didn't want B. to see me like this.

I drained a glass of water and then I cupped my hands under the faucet and splashed the water onto my face.

_It's been ten years, Lauren. Get over it._

Several minutes later, my breathing was mostly back to normal and the images storming my brain were less vivid.

I went back to the bedroom and crawled under the covers, feeling physically exhausted.

"Are you okay?"

My heart rate accelerated quickly at the realization that Bernard was awake.

"I'm fine."

"Are you sure?"

"I just needed a drink."

He held up his arm and I scooted over next to him, letting out a heavy sigh as I rested my head against his chest.

"You know…I'm a good listener," he said quietly a he stroked his hand over my hair.

"I know."

"We all have them from time to time. Sometimes it helps…"

"I'm fine," I interrupted.

He thought it was because of the job.

What would he say if he knew the truth?

_It's been fun, Hayes, but…_

That thought was even more upsetting than the old memories.

When we got up on Thursday morning, he didn't mention our middle-of-the-night interruption.

Instead, it was business as usual. Lupo called and said that he'd go to Secaucus alone if Bernard and I would meet up with Eames and get back into that security footage.

So we spent the morning scouring miles of tape, looking for anything out of the ordinary.

At ten, Lt. Van Buren called me.

"I don't know what Detective Lupo told you, but Major Case isn't all that special," she said when I answered. "I hope you're not planning on sticking around."

"No, ma'am," I replied. "Monday morning, I'll be back at the 2-7."

"That's good. I hear you've been doing exceptional work at MCS."

"Thank you."

"Don't thank me. I'm not the one who said it. But I like when my detectives work well with others. You and Eames will both be getting a gold star in your jacket."

"I appreciate that. I'll be sure to let Eames know."

"Lupo tells me you've been working with Bernard. Are you two getting along okay?"

"Yes, ma'am. He's very good," I replied, and I meant that in the most professional of ways, so maybe it was only my guilty conscience that made my statement sound dirty to my own ears.

"Yes, he is," she agreed. "You can learn a lot from him. Take advantage of your time together."

"I will."

"Okay, well, I'll let you get back to it. I just wanted to make sure this temporary extension was okay with you."

I hung up with my boss feeling good about myself.

I'd only had my shield for a little more than a month, and already my lieutenant was impressed with me. That was a _very_ good thing.

Maybe in another few years, I'd be able to come back to Major Case on a permanent basis.

"I'm going to get some coffee," the security guard who'd been sitting at the desk next to me stated. The office was set up in cubicles, and Bernard was at the desk behind me while Eames was in one on the other side of the low dividing wall.

"Make it four," Bernard told him, and then when the guard walked away, Bernard rolled his chair over closer to mine and asked, "Are your eyes crossing yet?"

"Only part way," I replied. "I don't even know exactly what we're looking for here."

"Something unusual," Eames spoke up, reminding me that even though I couldn't see him, he could still hear everything that was being said. "Like maybe someone lurking near Connie, or watching her excessively."

"Or working on a computer where they don't belong," Bernard added. "I'm kind of hoping that Mulder will be able to narrow down our parameters."

"Is he that good?"

"He's that weird," Eames said.

"Lupo swears by him," Bernard told me. "You know he wouldn't trust this to just anybody."

"That video was pretty creepy, huh?"

"Yeah, it's enough to give a person nightmares," Bernard said meaningfully as he held my gaze.

"I suppose it is," I agreed.

"So is it?" he asked, dropping his voice even more.

"Is it…no."

He leaned closer to me and said, "So it's something else."

"It's nothing."

"Three nights in a row is not nothing."

Three nights in a row?

I'd been having the dream, but it hadn't pulled me from sleep until last night. I guess maybe Bernard was a light sleeper.

"I'm not doing this now," I told him.

"But you are…doing this," he clarified. "Right? You know I only want to help."

"It's not about helping," I said, shaking my head. "It's more than that. It's…you know, this just isn't the place."

"Okay," he said with a nod. "I get that. But later on, we'll find the place."

"Okay."

"Promise?"

"Yeah, I…yeah. But I need you to promise me something, too."

"What?"

"After we talk…don't…um…don't…"

"Okay, now I'm worried," he said, glancing around to make sure no one was looking and then putting his hand on my knee. "Maybe we should take a break now."

"No, it's fine, it's…"

"Take a break," Eames called out to us. "Your whispering is ruining my concentration."

"We don't need a break," I replied firmly. "And we're done whispering. Right, Bernard?"

"Whatever you say, Hayes," he answered as he rolled back to the desk where he'd been working.

"Bernard…"

"No, I hear you," he said.

I turned back toward my computer and let out a quiet sigh.

How was I supposed to concentrate on work with so much other stuff on my mind?

_Somehow_, I reminded myself.

Because this was important and my personal drama could wait.

I managed to force everything else from my mind while I focused on the endless hours of video.

After awhile, Eames left to get lunch, and shortly thereafter, Lupo and Connie came down to the security office.

"We figured out a way to narrow it down," Lupo said triumphantly. "And Mulder wrote a program to help us do it."

"How's it going to work?" I asked.

"We've pinpointed the precise times that the three emails were sent. Mulder's program will run through the footage and isolate those exact times from every camera and create a still photo."

"Nice," Bernard said with a nod. "That just might save me from going blind today."

"I'll get it going and then we can go back upstairs. Eames should be back with lunch pretty soon, don't you think?"

"He should be," I agreed.

Lupo spoke briefly with one of the security officers, and then launched the program onto the system.

"How long?" Bernard asked him.

"Mulder said maybe a couple of hours."

"Okay. We're going to get some fresh air, and then we'll meet you and Eames back upstairs," Bernard said.

I raised an eyebrow at him, but he ignored me as he and Lupo talked.

"No problem. You guys have been holed up in here for four hours. Stretch your legs," Lupo agreed. "Once this program finishes, we'll need fresh eyes again to go through the photos and see if we can find out who was at a computer at all three times the emails were sent."

"During a work day?" I questioned, ignoring the uneasy feeling in my stomach at the prospect of being alone with Bernard right now. "I can't imagine that'll be a small number."

"Maybe not," Connie agreed. "But it'll give us something to work with. And Mulder said the guy is short. Five-seven or so."

"Not or so," Lupo said with a smirk. "Five-seven."

"Okay, so he's five-seven. If we can narrow it down to who was on a computer in each of the instances and who's five-seven, that should definitely weed a lot of people out."

I nodded my agreement and reluctantly followed Bernard to the door.

"We'll be back shortly," I said. "Are you going back to court?"

"Yes, she is," a man answered. I turned around and found that another guy had come into the security office. "I thought you might be down here. It's time to head back, if you're ready."

"Sure," Connie said. "Um…Carl, these are Detectives Bernard and Hayes. And you know Lupo," she introduced.

"You're working to catch this stalker guy?"

"That's the plan," Lupo said. "And it looks like maybe sooner than later."

"Well, good luck. Ready, Connie?"

Connie turned around and said something quietly to Lupo and then left with Carl.

"Have you checked him out?" I asked suspiciously.

And I don't know why I was suspicious, but sometimes it's difficult to pinpoint the origin of a hunch.

"He's too tall," Lupo said. "He doesn't fit the profile."

"Okay," I said with a nod.

"Hayes?" Bernard asked, nodding his head towards the door. "If we're going to take a break, now's the time, while the computer is doing its thing."

I'm pretty sure I wasn't the one who'd mentioned taking a break, but I wasn't going to stand there and argue with him about it.

Mostly because I knew he was just trying to be helpful.

But I still wasn't ready to talk.

Knowing I should and being able to do it were two completely different things.

But I followed Bernard out of the security office and through the lobby. We were both quiet until we were out on the sidewalk.

"You know, you don't have to tell me anything. We've moved this relationship along pretty quickly, and I shouldn't expect that you're going to tell me every little thing," he said.

"It's not that," I interrupted.

"No wait, let me finish. We talked about baggage. Well, mine is that I was used pretty badly, only a few months ago, and so now when I'm with you, and I know you're holding something back, something that's obviously upsetting to you, well, you can understand why that makes me uneasy and maybe a little bit suspicious."

"It's not anything like that, I promise," I said emphatically. "I'm not using you. I would never do that."

My stomach was in knots and I really, really hated this.

Why couldn't I just be normal? Relationships were difficult enough without dragging a decade-old issue into the mix.

_If I could just be past it…_

That was part of the problem. I didn't want to tell him because I still wasn't over it. Maybe if I was, then it wouldn't worry me so much.

But if I couldn't accept it, how could I expect him to?

"I know," he agreed as he reached to take hold of my hand. Just that simple action sent butterflies through me. "See, that's the thing. I _do_ trust you. It actually worries me that I trust you as much as I do, considering how little I know you, but I can't seem to help it."

_You have to get over it, Lauren, or he's going to quit trying. _

"Tell me something," I blurted out suddenly.

I'm not sure what made me say it, but once the words were out there, it sounded like a good idea. Maybe if he shared something that he wasn't proud of, then it might make it a little easier for me to open up, too.

"Tell you…what?"

"Tell me the worst thing about yourself. Something that you'd really rather I didn't know, but if we stay together, eventually I'm going to find out. Something that you think might scare me away, only I can promise you that it won't."

"The worst thing about myself?" he asked cautiously. "Well, it's not that easy. Because it's also the best thing."

He paused for a moment and led the way over to a bench across the street. We sat down together, my hand still in his, and he turned to look at me so that he could finish.

"I have a son," he stated. "And the reason why I say it's the worst is because he doesn't even know I exist."

"You have a son."

"Remember," he said with a nervous smile. "You promised that whatever I said wouldn't scare you away."

"I'm still here," I assured him. "Tell me about him."

"His mother was a one-night stand. By the time she found out she was pregnant, she'd fallen in love with someone, a good man who wanted to marry her. I thought, and she agreed, that it would be better for everyone if they raised the child together as their own."

"So you sacrificed your own happiness in hopes of offering your son a normal life."

"That's what I tell myself anyway. I don't know. Sometimes I think the decision was wrong. That I should be a part of his life. That he should know who his real father is, but…at the time, I honestly felt like it was the right thing to do."

"Wow. I'm…not sure what to say. So…how old is he?"

"He's eleven. I still send her money every month. She told me a few years ago that I didn't need to send it any more, but…I don't know. I can't seem to stop. I mean…he's my son. I want to make sure that he has what he needs."

The longing on his face as he told me his story…it very nearly made me cry.

And I didn't want to ask the next question, but I had to.

"So…are kids something that you think about? I mean, do you want them?"

"I'm forty-three years old," he answered. "And for the longest time, I've been okay with the idea that it wasn't going to happen, but I don't know. Now I'm thinking that maybe I was just waiting for the right person to come along. I know it's crazy, Lauren, but…now I'm thinking that maybe kids wouldn't be so bad."

I dropped my gaze to the broken sidewalk at my feet, focusing on the jagged lines and cracks in the concrete.

And then I practiced my breathing technique.

Because I was about to hyperventilate.

"So now it's your turn," he said.

How was I supposed to tell him?

He'd either walk…or he wouldn't, which was almost worse because then he'd be sacrificing for me.

And how in the world could I ask him to do that?

I couldn't.

"I'm…I…" I began ineloquently, still unable to meet his eyes.

"Lauren?"

I was breathing faster now and I had to get a handle on myself.

_Quick and easy_, I thought.

Just get it over with.

I've only been with him for a couple of weeks…only sleeping with him for less than half of that, so how bad could it be?

I pulled my hand from his grasp and got up from the bench. He looked at me questioningly, but I forced myself not to get lost in his eyes.

"I think you're right," I said, my voice sounding shaky and weak.

"About what?" he asked as he got up to stand in front of me.

"We jumped into this quickly. And I'm thinking that we rushed things too much. And I know that's my fault, and I'm sorry, but…I need to take a step back."

"A step back? You mean…"

"I mean, I want us to be friends, but…"

"Wait, are you calling it quits?" he asked in disbelief. "Because of what I told you?"

"No! That's not it!"

"But you _are_ ending it between us."

"I'm…"

_Do it, Lauren. _

"Yes," I said at last. "I'm sorry, but…this was a mistake."

I couldn't look at him for another second, so I turned and walked quickly back towards the DA's office.

I'd undoubtedly hurt him, but in the end it would be better.

For him, I mean.

As far as I was concerned, I was done.

This was too hard.

I wasn't going to allow myself to feel anything for a man again.

He called out to me once, but I kept going, striding swiftly towards my destination while working desperately to fight back the tears that wanted to escape.

"Lauren, wait!" I heard again, and then he yelled loudly in frustration, "Stop!"

I could tell from the sound of his voice that he was rapidly approaching, so I finally stopped.

I didn't turn around because I was still struggling with my emotions, but I waited and let him catch up to me, mostly because if he was going to yell at me, then I needed to let him. I owed him that much.

And he needed to do it before we went back inside, because once we went back in, we were going to need to work together like nothing was wrong.

"You don't just say something like that and…" he began, putting his hand on my arm to turn me around. I started to look at him, but then Lupo shouted from the front door.

"It's Carl!" he said as he barreled down the steps. Eames was right on his heels.

"What?" Bernard and I responded simultaneously.

"It's Carl. Mulder realized he made an error in his height calculation, and then the court officer called Cutter, looking for Connie because she didn't show up for the afternoon session and she's not answering her phone."

"So we don't know where she is?" I asked in alarm.

Lupo was wild-eyed and bordering on hysterical, and Bernard stepped up to him and put a hand on his shoulder.

"We'll find her. Hayes and I will trace her steps to the courthouse. You and Eames get Carl's address and go to his place. We'll get a BOLO put out for him, and we'll get every available unit patrolling the area," he said calmly.

"I let her walk away with him," Lupo said, shaking his head. "I didn't even do a background check on the guy. She said he was okay, and I just…"

"Lupes," Bernard said firmly, interrupting his self-flagellation. "We'll find her."

TBC...


	27. Chapter 27

**Liz POV**

* * *

><p>The mood in the car was somber as we headed for Baltimore.<p>

For the first half hour or so, we discussed the idea of Jeremy going to see Dr. Skoda.

"You think I should get hypnotized?" Jeremy asked skeptically.

"The consensus is that maybe some of your memories are repressed due to shock," Danny answered.

"What do you think?" Jeremy questioned, looking at me.

I was in the front passenger seat, but I'd shifted around so that I could see Jeremy as he sat in the back behind Danny.

"Tell me this," I stated. "Have you taken that combination of drugs before?"

He looked hesitant and so I added, "I'm not asking so that I can bust your balls about it. I'm asking because I'm curious as to whether or not it previously caused memory loss."

"Oh. Um…yeah, once or twice," he admitted. "Actually, three other times in addition to last Friday night."

I mentally praised Danny for not making a sound at Jeremy's admission.

"And those other times you were drinking as well?"

"Yes. I know. Stupid, right?"

"Yes," I agreed with a smile. "But we've already covered that. So those other times…did you have gaping holes in your memory?"

I studied Jeremy as he sat back in the seat and pondered my question.

He was such a smart kid, when he wasn't displaying an attitude. And to his credit, after his initial juvenile display last Saturday morning, he'd been fairly mature.

I wondered if he considered how easily he could've been killed, too.

I could appreciate the fear of that poignant realization, the knowledge that things could've just as easily gone another way.

That was another reason why I thought Skoda was a good idea. He could start with the hypnosis, but then he could also get Jeremy talking about his feelings in general.

I knew he'd talked some with Bobby and Alex, and that was a very good thing, but it wouldn't hurt to keep him as vocal as possible.

"No," he answered at last. "I mean, maybe there were some little things that slipped my mind, but for the most part, I remembered everything just fine."

"Which means that maybe you're just subconsciously blocking it out rather than being mentally incapable of recall," I told him. "Dr. Skoda may be able to help you with that."

"Okay," he agreed with a nod.

I felt a little bad that he was willing because I'd confirmed that it was a smart decision, as opposed to simply doing it at Danny's request, but I wasn't going to worry too much about it.

The dichotomy of fathers and sons was a mystery that I was only recently beginning to unravel.

"Do you know what you're going to say today?" Danny asked, glancing at his son in the rearview mirror.

Kelly's parents had offered for Jeremy to say a few words at the memorial service. He'd met them a few times when they'd visited Kelly at school.

I knew that bugged Danny, too. He hadn't even heard Kelly's name prior to last weekend.

_Maybe I'll set up a time for him to sit on Skoda's couch, too._

"Not really. I can't make up my mind. I mean, am I supposed to talk about how much I'm going to miss her? Or what a great person she was? Or…I don't know."

Jeremy was looking at me when he posed the question, but I stayed quiet in hopes that Danny would answer. As much as I enjoyed cultivating my own relationship with him, I didn't want to come between the two of them.

"You say whatever comes to mind," Danny replied. "There's no right or wrong answer."

"Yeah, but…okay. Never mind."

We rode in silence for several minutes, and then Danny spoke up again.

"How did you and Kelly meet?"

"Flag football," Jeremy answered, and I watched him as a smile came over his face.

"She came to watch you?"

"No, it's co-ed. She was on the other team. I caught a pass and was running for the end zone, and she was right behind me. At the last second, she grabbed for my flag, only she tripped and grabbed onto my shorts instead."

"She pantsed you?" Danny asked in amusement.

Jeremy laughed lightly and shook his head.

"She was mortified, but I didn't care. I scored the touchdown _and_ guilted her into going out with me."

"Well, there you go. That's what you can say."

"At the service? I don't know…"

"It's a sweet memory," I encouraged, quickly agreeing with Danny.

He nodded thoughtfully and turned to look out the window.

"She was really smart," he said quietly. "She wanted to be a doctor. She was going to apply to Mt. Sinai for medical school."

I masked my excitement at his willingness to open up about Kelly.

For five days now, he'd said very little, so I didn't want to spook him with over exuberance.

Danny caught my eye and I gave him a subtle nod, encouraging him to pick up the thread.

"She wanted to move to New York?"

"I told her that I was going to apply to the academy after graduation. She said that she knew we were too young to make any kind of long-term commitment, but that she at least wanted to be in the same city so that we could give it a shot."

"You said you two weren't that serious," I reminded him gently.

"That was my party line," he admitted. "I wasn't sure how she felt and I didn't want to look lame when she ended up dumping me."

"When did she tell you?" Danny asked. "About Mt. Sinai?"

I was glad he asked, because I was wondering the same thing.

Why would Jeremy have a pre-emptive break-up party line if she'd already opened up to him about her plans to move to New York just to be near him?

"It was…um…"

He paused and focused hard, staring at the back of Danny's seat, and then he slowly brought his eyes to mine.

"It was Friday night. She told me…she said that she'd looked up how much money cops make in New York," he said, his words coming faster as the memory came back to him. "She said that it wasn't a lot, but that if we were careful, we'd be okay until she got out of med school."

"She wanted you two to live together?"

"Yeah," he said in wonderment, and his face was a mixture of pleasure and pain.

My heart went out to him. He was finally able to fully grasp the depth of her feelings for him, but now she was gone.

His eyes filled with tears, but nothing fell. He shook his head, as though warding off the memory, and then turned again to look out the window.

The rest of the trip was mostly quiet. We arrived in Baltimore a little ahead of schedule, but it gave us time to meet briefly with Kelly's parents before the service.

After the memorial and subsequent burial, the three of us headed for the car.

"You did really well," Danny told Jeremy, putting his arm across his son's shoulders.

"Thanks. I…would it be okay if I go for a walk before we head back? I just…I don't know. I want to clear my head and maybe say goodbye to her one more time."

"Sure. Take your time," Danny agreed, looking around at the neighboring businesses. "We'll go sit in that coffee shop over there. Just come get us when you're ready."

"Leave your phone on," I added. "I don't want to worry about you wandering around the city."

"Yes, Mom," he said in a teasing manner.

"If your mother ever heard you say that…"

"She'd kick my ass," he finished.

"Butt," I corrected.

He flashed me a quick smile before hugging us both, and then he took off in the opposite direction. I picked up Danny's hand and together we walked slowly towards the coffee shop.

"He's so grown," he said quietly. "I look at him, and I…"

"See you?"

"Some," he admitted, then he let go of my hand and instead put his arm around me. "Only so much better."

"Well, that's the natural order of things, right?" I asked him as I leaned my head against his shoulder. "The children should surpass their parents. That means Jeremy's going to have to be Commissioner someday."

He hummed thoughtfully and said, "Assuming he can get past this mess."

"He's halfway there now," I assured him. "If he's got even half of your strength, he'll come out of this just fine."

It was a beautiful day outside, so when we went into the coffee shop, we found a window-front table.

"Do you mind if I make a couple of calls?" he asked me after we ordered our coffee.

"Do you think your detectives are slacking off while you're out of town?"

"No," he said with a smile. "But a hostage situation isn't out of the realm of possibility."

"Make your calls. I'm going to check in with the office, too."

I spoke briefly with Jenkins and was happy to hear that things were moving along smoothly.

The evidence from Cher Quarles' murder case had shown up, so I told him just to sit on it. If it wasn't too late when we got back to town, I would go in and look it over.

After my call, I sipped my coffee and waited for Danny to finish.

"Two down," he said when he hung up his phone.

I didn't have to ask who he'd called first.

As judgmental and condemnatory of Bobby and Alex as he'd been before, he was paradoxically protective now.

And okay, so it was mostly Bobby he'd disapproved of, but still…now I was starting to think he'd give Bobby a kidney, if the need ever arose.

"I'm guessing things are fine?"

"Bobby and Alex are in Jersey. They have a suspect in their case, and they got word that he was crashing at a friend's place, so they're just getting ready to pick him up."

"And the Logans?" I questioned, knowing that had been call number two.

"They're at 1PP. Their suspect lawyered up, so they're waiting for the attorney to arrive and then they're going to see what they can get from him. The evidence is pretty solid, so confession or not, I'm sure the DA will agree to go forward with the charges."

"Your fab four will solve their respective cases within a week. I'm sure the commissioner will love to hear that."

"They do make me look good," he agreed. "And they mind the store well. Carolyn got updates from the other on-duty detectives, so she saved me another half-dozen phone calls."

"You need to just make one of them captain."

"Maybe. But which one? None of them will work without their partner. And each of them would be equally capable of filling that spot."

"All of them? You're telling me that you think Mike Logan could run MCS?" I asked, goading a response from him.

Because Alex, I could easily understand.

Carolyn had less developed people-skills, but would probably make out just fine, too.

Bobby would go crazy sitting behind a desk, but if he could get over that aspect, I had no doubt he'd be brilliant.

And then there was Mike.

Personally, I love Mike. And Danny had come around to that as well, but I still wondered about his thoughts on Mike's managerial potential.

"Logan has attributes that would make him a fine leader," he responded. "But he'd never take the position. Like I said, none of them would."

He was right about that.

As much as they all loved the job, they all loved working with each other more.

And the captain's spot meant more paperwork, more office time, and less time actually solving crime.

"I'm not worried about it," he continued. "Right now, things seem to be working just fine as they are."

And that was true. Every detective in the department was working well as part of the team, so for the time being, there was no need to fill the spot.

"Let me check in with Lupo and Bernard and maybe by then, Jeremy will be back."

He dialed Lupo, but it went to voice mail, so then he called Bernard.

"Are the mice playing, Detective? Because you know, I'm not that far away. Where's your partner?" he joked.

He listened for a moment and then his face clouded over, putting me instantly on alert.

"That's fine. Is it out? No, you were exactly right. We'll be leaving here soon, but keep me posted."

He hung up and said, "Connie's stalker made his move. It's another lawyer, one she's working a case with right now."

"Made his move? You mean he snatched her up?"

"It looks like it. She walked with him to the courthouse, but never made it. Bernard issued a statewide BOLO for the guy, and he and Hayes are retracing the route between the office and court. Lupo and Eames went to check out the guy's apartment."

"Oh, my God," I mumbled blankly. "Danny…"

"I know. We need to get back," he agreed as he dialed another number. "I'm going to call Jeremy and have him get back here right away."

I pulled out some money to leave on the table as the two of us got up and left the coffee shop.

Danny muttered a curse and hung up his phone before dialing again.

"What is it?" I asked him.

"He's not answering," he said. "And now it's going straight to voice mail."

"He turned it off?" I asked in concern.

"Uh huh. He ignored the first call and then he turned it off."

We stood together on the sidewalk, neither of us exactly sure of what to do.

"Where do you think he is?" I asked at last.

"I don't know…I…"

"He started remembering," I interrupted. "What if it all came back to him?"

It happened. In situations like this, often times when the memories began to resurface, it triggered a whole flood of recall.

"He knows who killed her," I stated as Danny looked at me worriedly.

"That's why he wanted to go for a walk. He remembered," he said with a slow nod.

"And he went to confront him."

TBC...


	28. Chapter 28

**Alex POV**

* * *

><p>I hung up with Ross just as I turned the corner into Sgt. Moreno's neighborhood.<p>

It was a rather sketchy looking community and I was starting to wonder if maybe we should've called the locals.

We'd dropped by the recruiting station earlier and had learned that Sgt. Moreno was off duty today, but a helpful PFC had mentioned that Moreno had a _friend from New York City_ staying with him.

I would've preferred to catch Randall at the house alone, especially since I was still wearing this damn sling.

Now it had the potential to be two against one and a half.

"You're not ditching the sling," Bobby said as I drove slowly towards the correct address.

I sighed heavily, glancing at him and rolling my eyes before returning my focus to the road.

"You know, one of these days that's really going to start getting on my nerves."

"My over-protectiveness?"

"Your mind reading."

"It doesn't take a psychic to know that we're going into a situation with two potential hostiles and you're down to one arm," he said reasonably. "But honey, you're forgetting one thing."

"What's that?"

"You're better with one arm than most men are with two. I'll put my money on you and me every day of the week."

The man could cut off my bad moods at the knees.

"Do you think the PFC tipped him off?"

"I think he was totally clueless," he answered. Then he pointed to a small house on the corner. The yard was overrun with weeds and various kids' toys. "There it is."

"Moreno's got a kid?" I asked, pulling over next to the curb, still two houses away.

"There's nothing in his file that mentions a kid."

"I guess Randall hasn't been here long enough to pitch in and do yard work," I commented as I got out of the car.

I checked my weapon and then tucked it back into its holster as I met Bobby at the front of the SUV.

I wasn't sure exactly why I was expecting trouble from this guy. Maybe because he was only two months out of the Army and he was holed up in a place most likely stocked with guns.

Although he probably didn't know we were after him.

But it was gut instinct that had me pulling out my phone.

"I think we'll give the Bloomfield PD a heads-up," I said.

"You mean, play it by the book?" he asked me as he fought back a smile.

"We're not required to let them know. It's just courtesy. And since when have you ever known me to be courteous?"

"You're feeling it, too," he said, holding my gaze and acknowledging the gravity of the moment.

"I can't explain it," I admitted.

"You don't have to. Call the BPD."

So I made the call and let them know that we were about to pick up a person of interest in their jurisdiction, and I intimated that they could feel free to send a black and white through the neighborhood.

Because looking at the neighborhood, I was pretty sure that one would never just happen to roll through.

Cops avoided areas like this like the plague.

"If we can spare the manpower," the dispatcher responded blandly.

"We rate up there with jury duty and a trip to the DMV," I told Bobby as I hung up the phone. "So let's just go in and grab the guy without any fuss, okay?"

He nodded at me, with his game face in place, and together we approached the house.

The front yard was enclosed by a fence, if you could call it that. It was broken in several places, and leaning dangerously close to the ground in others.

I felt ridiculous opening the gate to step onto the sidewalk, but I still did it.

And I left it open, in case for some reason we needed to make a hasty retreat.

Again, I don't know what was causing my unease, but it was there, so I respected it.

When we were halfway up the walk, we could hear voices from inside the house.

"Get your shit and get out, bitch!"

I cast a sideways glance at Bobby who shrugged at me, but settled his hand on the butt of his weapon.

"You're kicking me out?" a woman shouted back. "What about him?"

The front door flung open and a man walked out onto the porch. He was looking backwards, so he hadn't seen us yet, but he had a gun in his hand, down at his side.

"Hey, bros before hos, right?" he said scathingly, and then he raised the gun and pointed it at someone still inside the house. "I'm gonna count to ten and then I'm gonna start shootin'."

We both drew our weapons, and I called out, "Delfina Moreno!"

He whirled around to face us, and I don't know whether he intended to or not, but he ended up pointing his gun at us.

"Who the fuck are you?" he shouted, and his words were slurred.

Great.

He was armed _and_ drunk.

"NYPD," Bobby answered. "Put down the gun."

"NYPD? You know this is fuckin' Jersey, right?"

"Even in Jersey you can't point your gun at cops," I told him.

"We're not here for you," Bobby added. "Don't make trouble for yourself."

"Not here for me?" he repeated in confusion. Then he turned around and looked back in the house, "Nina, what the fuck did you do this time?"

"Moreno, put down the gun!" Bobby said again.

"Look, whatever that bitch did…"

"We're looking for Jim Randall," I interrupted. "Is he on the premises?"

"Jimmy? Nah, I ain't seen him."

"You're a fucking liar, Del!" the woman shouted as she came to stand in the doorway. "He just went out the back!"

"Bitch, I'm gonna kill you for that!" Moreno yelled, adjusting his aim back to Nina.

I fired my gun, catching him in the shoulder and knocking him backwards into the exterior wall of the house.

"Alex…" Bobby said, taking one step toward the side of the house.

"I got this! Go!"

So Bobby took off around the back of the house while I carefully approached Moreno.

Nina was screaming and there was a baby crying inside the house, and Moreno was cursing a blue streak.

But he'd dropped the gun.

And I'd honestly thought he was going to shoot the woman, so…

"You shot him!" Nina cried out, dropping to her knees next to Moreno.

"He was going to shoot _you_," I reminded her as I kicked his discarded gun out of reach.

I couldn't deal with this situation with one arm, so I looked at Nina and pointed to a broken chair on the other side of the porch.

"Sit there," I said. "And don't move. Who else is in the house?"

She sat down and said, "Just my little nephew. He's in the bedroom."

"Is he safe?"

"Yeah, as long as you don't shoot him," she said smartly. I pinned her with a stare and she lost some of the attitude. "He's in the crib. He was taking a nap."

"Well, he's not now," I mumbled.

"Thanks to you," she retorted. "My Del would never shoot me, would you, baby?"

"Are you kidding me? He was kicking you out at gunpoint when we got here!" I reminded her as I jammed my gun back into its holster and then pulled off my sling.

With my second hand free, I was able to pull out my phone to call for an ambulance while I knelt down to assess the damage to Moreno.

"Oh, that's just 'cos I got busy with his man Jimmy, but Del knows that don't mean nothing, don't you, baby?"

"Yeah, baby," Moreno replied, and then he glared at me and said, "I wasn't gonna shoot her."

"Then you should've dropped the gun when my partner instructed you to instead of stalling us while your buddy escaped. You know that makes you an accessory after the fact, right?"

"Accessory? To what?"

"Murder."

"Whoa, hey, Jimmy didn't kill nobody."

"Hold that thought," I told him as I moved his shirt out of the way so that I could see the wound.

At the same time, the 9-1-1 operator answered, so as I prodded at Moreno's shoulder, I requested an ambulance.

"It's barely more than a flesh wound," I said on the phone.

"Flesh wound? You shot me, bitch!"

I pulled up the bottom portion of his t-shirt and used it as a bandage because even though the wound didn't look that serious, it was bleeding quite a bit.

I pushed hard against the blood flow as I passed along the pertinent information to the operator and then I shoved my phone back into my pocket.

"You're fine," I told him in annoyance. "It hardly clipped you. Now tell me again how Jimmy didn't kill _no_body."

"Because he's been _here_."

"Since when?" I asked, and then I looked at Nina and said, "You answer that one."

"He got here last night," she said.

"And you slept with him already?" I questioned. It's not that my question was really relevant, but I couldn't help myself.

"Del wanted me to because he said Jimmy was depressed," she stated emphatically. I looked back at Moreno and raised my eyebrow at him.

"Yeah, okay. I told her she could," he admitted. Then he looked past me over to Nina and added, "But I only meant _last_ night. Not today, too."

"I'm sorry, baby," she said, her eyes instantly filling with tears. "You know I don't care about nobody but you."

_Oh my God._

These two were real pieces of work.

"Okay, Juliet. Can the drama," I told her. "Tell me what Jimmy said when he got here last night."

"What he said? He didn't say nothing."

"I mean, why did he come here?" I clarified.

"We go way back," Moreno answered.

"I know. All the way back to Bragg, right? So tell me about Eva."

"Who's Eva?" Nina asked sharply.

"She was Jimmy's girl," he explained quickly. Then he glanced at me and added, "Just for a little while, I mean. It wasn't nothing serious."

I kept my face impassive while on the inside, I was doing cartwheels.

Moreno had just established the relationship between Randall and Eva, the first victim.

We knew he'd been stationed there, but they must have dated on the down low, because as far as we could tell, the cops had never questioned him for her murder. Or at least, not anything further than getting an alibi, which was what they'd done to every soldier on base.

"Okay, so Eva was nothing serious. What about Vanessa?"

"I'm done talking."

"You know, I thought recruiters were supposed to be a little more…squared away than this," I said.

I picked up his hand and moved it on top of the shirt so that he could apply his own pressure.

Then I stood up and took a couple of steps away from him, listening intently for any sounds coming from the back.

I was a little concerned that Bobby hadn't come back yet.

"I'm off duty," he retorted in response to my remark.

"Is a recruiter ever really off duty? I mean, it's kind of like a cop, right? Even when you're not working, you're working. I wonder what your CO would say if he could see you now."

"You're gonna rat me out?"

"I don't have to. The police will be here in a minute to take you in. I'm sure the word will get back to your commanding officer."

"Police?" Nina asked. "I thought you were the police."

"NYPD," I stated. "We're just here to take Randall back to the city."

"Because you think he killed somebody?" Moreno questioned dubiously.

"We're pretty sure, yeah. And you're pretty sure, too. Otherwise, why stall so that he could get away? What did you think he was running away _from_?"

He sighed heavily and then grimaced, as though the action caused him pain.

"Oh, baby," Nina cooed. "Are you okay?"

"I'm shot," he said sharply. "What do you think?"

"I think the EMT's are going to slap on a Band-Aid and hand you over to the BPD," I told him.

"But I didn't _do_ nothing. Why'd they wanna take me in?"

"Questioning. And depending on how cooperative you are, there may or may not be charges."

I still couldn't hear any sounds as I walked closer to the corner of the house.

What was taking him so long? I wasn't exactly sure how long it had been, but ten minutes at least. Usually by that point, the suspect was either caught or in the wind.

"What's around back?" I asked Moreno.

"Woods."

"Was Jimmy armed?"

"Hell, yeah. Jimmy always packs a nine."

The words were barely out of his mouth when I heard a gunshot.

"Shit," I said under my breath, and then I whipped my cuffs off my belt.

"Come here!" I barked at Nina, and she instantly hopped up from her spot and hustled over to me.

I slapped one end of the cuffs on Moreno and the other end on Nina, with the porch railing in between them.

"Hey, what the…"

"Shut up!" I ordered as I retrieved the gun that I'd previously kicked away. I shoved it into the front of my jeans and then ran down the steps and around the corner of the house.

As I approached the edge of the woods, I heard a second shot.

And then a third.

With my heart in my throat, I barreled through the trees in search of my partner.

TBC...


	29. Chapter 29

**Connie POV**

* * *

><p>I must be a horrible judge of character.<p>

Because even when Lupo told me that it could be someone I knew, someone who'd been trying to get close to me, I never once considered Carl.

We've been working together for a couple of years now, and I'd always just thought of him as a nice guy. He was a little on the quiet side, but he was a decent lawyer, and most of the time when I wasn't working as second chair for Mike, then Carl was second chairing for me.

"So they think they've got this stalker guy all figured out, huh?" he asked me as we headed for the courthouse.

"It won't be long now. I can't wait to find out who the little twerp is."

"Little twerp," he repeated, and for the first time today, I felt unease.

He was still chatting easily, like normal, but it was what he was saying.

"Why, just because he doesn't carry a badge and a gun?" he continued. "What is it with women and cops? Is it that they all want to be saved? They want some big, bad hero to ride in and save the day? It's just a fantasy. That's all it is. Cops aren't heroes. They're just men who like to think that they can measure their dick in terms of how many crooks they get off the streets."

I stopped walking as he continued his rant. He'd started off almost jokingly, but his tone had escalated to downright loathing.

I was so astonished that my reflexes were slow, but I was finally grasping the situation.

_It was really him_.

He took two more steps forward and then turned back to look at me in surprise, as though he couldn't understand why I wasn't still beside him.

But when he looked at me, he must have seen the fear on my face, because then he quickly approached me again, pointing his finger at me as he spit out, "Lupo's got _nothing_ on me. Look how long he's been chasing his tail, trying to figure out who was threatening you. He's a moron. A dolt. And I've got to tell you," he said, grabbing onto my arm as he lowered his voice. "I've seen you two in action. He leaves a lot to be desired when it comes to that arena, don't you think? A woman like you should be treated respectably, gently, carefully…"

"I can't believe it's you," I said, as I attempted to jerk my arm away from him.

"Why, you think I'm not man enough?" he ground out.

I continued to try to pull away, and the next thing I knew, he was jamming a knife against my stomach. He held it so that it was mostly hidden by his hand, so as not to call too much attention to it, but I could definitely feel it.

"Don't cause a scene," he warned. "I don't want to hurt you. But I will."

I nodded and took a deep breath as I tried to remember what Lupo had taught me.

"_If you find yourself in a bad situation, like if he's holding you at gunpoint or with a knife, don't try to rush your escape. Unless he's a pro, and I'm pretty sure this guy isn't, at some point he'll relax his guard. And that's when you make your move."_

"Relax, Carl," I said calmly. "I'm not fighting you anymore. Just tell me what you want from me."

"What do I want from you?" he repeated incredulously.

And then a passing pedestrian slowed his pace as he walked by, looking at me with concern.

"Are you okay?" the guy asked me, pausing a few feet away from us.

"She's fine," Carl answered quickly, moving closer to me to keep the knife hidden between us. "Just a little spat, right, honey?"

I could feel the tip of the blade directly against my skin now. He'd pushed it through my blazer and my blouse.

"I'm okay," I assured the Good Samaritan.

I wanted to give him some kind of sign, but Carl kept his eyes on me, and I was afraid that any move I made would cause him to ram the knife further into me.

The man continued down the sidewalk, and then Carl pulled me towards a diner that was half a block away.

"Good girl," he said as we went into the diner. "Just come with me, and everything will be fine. If you try to run…"

"I won't," I promised.

"If you do," he continued, apparently hell bent on issuing his full threat and exercising his authority. "I'll stick this whole blade into you. I wonder how long it'll take you to bleed out from a knife wound to the gut, huh? I mean, if you get help right away, you might be fine. Unless I hit the aortic artery. That might not be so good. But I'm not a doctor, so what do I know?"

"No, that's right. You're a lawyer," I reminded him. "So you have to know the kind of trouble you'll be facing from a kidnapping charge."

"Kidnapping? But you're coming willingly, right? I mean, isn't that what you said?"

He flashed me a smile as he tugged me through the diner and out the back exit.

I wondered how long it would take for Lupo to realize that I was gone.

And even once he did, how would he know where to look?

I tried to make eye contact with people as we passed through, on the hope that they'd remember me later, but no one seemed to be paying any attention.

Once we were in the back alley, Carl didn't hesitate. He walked towards the adjacent building, and then we went inside. It was a clothing store, and no one spared us a glance. We went out the front door, across the street, and then into another building.

This wasn't random.

Carl had planned this out.

I was pretty sure that he hadn't planned it for _today,_ but he'd definitely created a plan of attack that would allow him to avoid detection.

He continued talking to me as we walked, as though we were on a date. Well, a weird date, but he was casual nonetheless.

And he was apparently obsessed with the idea that he was the perfect man for me, as opposed to Lupo, who was bearing the brunt of Carl's hostility.

I was almost glad that Lupo wasn't with me.

I had a feeling that if given the chance, Carl would've killed him in a second, just to eliminate the competition. I thought that I'd be safe for a little while as long as I played along with his game.

"What were you thinking?" he asked me as we went through yet another office building and then emerged on the backside of that one, which put us at least five blocks away from the office-to-courthouse path.

"I don't know," I answered, mostly because I wasn't sure what he was talking about.

"Come on, Connie. You have to know what was on your mind. A cop? Really?"

"It was a moment of weakness," I said. "It doesn't mean anything."

He stopped walking and looked at me, both hopefully and suspiciously.

"But you're engaged."

"He asked, and I…didn't know how to say no."

"That's it, isn't it? He forces you to do things," he said gruffly, jerking me forward again. "I knew it had to be something like that. When I saw what he did to you in Baltimore…"

What he'd done to me? It was more like what we'd done to each other, and honestly, it was one of our more memorable performances, although it was now tainted by the knowledge that Carl had us on tape.

But still…I'm not sure what Carl was looking at when he watched the two of us together, because I could distinctly remember calling to God on three occasions that night.

I tuned him out as he continued to rant about Lupo's supposedly inept sexual technique, and instead I tried to think back over my lessons.

_"Evaluate your assets," _Lupo had told me._ "Things that you wouldn't normally think of as weapons can help you get out of a jam. Bobby pin…the heel of your shoe…anything sharp or that can increase the effectiveness of your attack. And if at all possible, silence your cell. Inexperienced attackers might not think of the cell right away so the longer it stays quiet, the longer the opportunity to track your GPS." _

I didn't have any bobby pins in my hair, but my shoes might work. The heels were slightly pointy and if I aimed right, I could probably do some damage with them.

My phone was in the left pocket of my blazer, and Carl was standing on my right. I was pretty sure that the device was still on silent because I didn't remember changing it after court let out.

Not only that, but I'd now been with Carl for at least twenty minutes. We were late for court.

Someone would've called the office to check on me, and that call would've been routed to Mike.

Undoubtedly, the search had already begun.

Which meant that Lupo had already called my phone and learned that I wasn't answering.

Was he tracking the GPS?

Without a doubt.

But I wasn't sure how long that process took.

"Unless you like it rough," he said, stopping our progress again and whirling me around so that I was in front of him. It bothered me to see that he seemed aroused by his own suggestion. "Is that it, Connie? You like guys who smack you around?"

"Lupo doesn't do that," I insisted.

I wasn't sure if I should still be playing up to his fantasy, but for some reason, that was the line for me. I wasn't about to let anyone think that Lupo was physically abusive.

"Well, maybe he doesn't hit you, but he doesn't cherish you either," he stated.

He still had me by the wrist, and now he moved the knife up near my throat. I took a step back and he went with me until my back was against the wall.

We were currently inside of an apartment building, in an empty lobby.

"Don't be afraid," he said, moving closer so that his body was against mine while he continued to maintain pressure with the knife against my neck. "I can give you what you want. You like rough sex? Is that why you picked a cop? Well guess what…you didn't have to lower your standards to get it, because I like it like that, too."

"Is that what this is about? Sex? You're risking your career, your freedom, just to have sex with me?" I asked him, hoping to hit him with a dose of reality. "Come on, Carl. I mean, I like to think I'm okay, but I'm not worth all of that."

"What are you talking about, risking my career? Because we blew off court?" he asked. He was clearly completely delusional. I just stared at him as he continued. "I'm sure Cutter will let it slide, especially when you explain to him that we just couldn't help ourselves…and that we spent the afternoon…you know…"

He trailed off his nauseating statement as he reached up to touch me, but then the elevator doors opened and a man stepped off, heading for the exit.

Carl quickly moved the knife away from my throat and settled it near my waist again.

He didn't turn around to look, but instead, held my gaze while the other man left the building.

"Let's go where we can have some privacy. I want to show you what you've been missing."

"No," I said quietly.

This wasn't exactly a time when he had his guard down, but I was afraid that once we got where he was taking me, then I might not be able to get free.

"Don't do this, Connie," he said menacingly, pushing the knife harder against me.

I bit back the cry that wanted to escape when I felt the knife puncture my skin. He held it still for a moment, and then backed off slightly as he shoved me toward the fire exit.

"And don't be brave thinking that hero boy is going to find you," he continued. "I disabled your phone's GPS two days ago. I'm guessing that right about now, he's staring at my empty apartment, wondering how he let me take you right from under his nose."

TBC...


	30. Chapter 30

**Bobby POV**

* * *

><p>"For a soldier, you're a lousy shot," I said gruffly as I grabbed Randall by his arms and flipped him onto his stomach.<p>

I put a knee into his back as I reached for the gun that he'd dropped a moment ago.

"Yeah, well, you're a cop and you didn't hit me either."

"Make no mistake about it. If I wanted to shoot you, you'd be bleeding right now."

My adrenaline was pumping hard, causing me to handcuff him in a much rougher manner than I would normally do, but the guy had seriously pissed me off.

He'd shot at me.

Twice.

And that was _after_ I'd chased him for at least a mile through the woods, across a creek, and into an abandoned barn.

Alex was probably out of her mind right about now, especially if she heard the shots.

And who am I kidding?

Of course she heard the shots.

I'd fired once, over his head in a last ditch effort to get him to stop.

But he'd kept running, into this barn, and then he'd turned around and unloaded two rounds before tripping over a trough and falling onto his ass.

At that point, I'd pounced on him, pinning him to the floor as I slammed his hand against the plank floor boards until he finally dropped the gun.

"Look, I don't even know what you want with me," he pleaded as I stood up and then jerked him to his feet.

"You don't know what I want. You ran…you pulled a gun on me…and you don't know what I want."

"I'm telling you, I…"

"Vanessa Sullivan," I said as I started tugging him toward the barn door. It was going to be a long walk back.

I pulled out my phone with one hand as I held onto the chain between the cuffs with the other.

No signal.

Great.

"Who?" he replied.

"The girl you killed. Or one of them anyway."

I pushed him along as we retraced our steps.

Another pair of shoes ruined. Alex had just bought me these, too, to replace the ones I'd messed up chasing after Skinny.

"I didn't kill nobody," he insisted.

"Why is it that guys always say that after they run?" I posed. "I mean, why run if you didn't do anything?"

He scoffed at me, but I pushed the issue. I mean, hell, we had a fifteen minute walk ahead of us. I may as well use the opportunity to probe his mind.

"I'm serious. If you're innocent, then what do you think you have to gain by running? Because you know…now you _are_ guilty, even if you didn't commit the murders."

"Of what?"

"You shot at me, remember? I'm a cop."

I checked my phone again, but I still didn't have anything.

It was like I was in another dimension.

And I knew Alex wouldn't call me because she wouldn't want my phone to ring, not knowing the situation, so I'd have to just keep checking my signal until I got something so that I could ease her mind.

"Yeah, you said NYPD. You're not a cop here."

"Are you licensed to carry a weapon in New Jersey?" I countered. I took his silence to mean no. "See? I can arrest you."

"On a piddly ass weapons charge?"

"That's where the firing at a cop comes into play. Because you know what? I make a pretty reliable witness on the stand. And suddenly your piddly ass weapons charge becomes a felony with jail time."

He grunted his irritation with me, but continued to walk without too much resistance. I checked my phone again and then kept talking.

"But if you cooperate, maybe I'll just forget about the fact that you shot at me."

"Really?" he asked in disbelief.

"Sure, why not?" I questioned with false amicability. "The two murder charges are probably enough."

"I didn't kill Vanessa."

"Oh, so now you're going to admit that you know her."

"She was my girlfriend."

"One who you beat up on from time to time. She was going to leave you, wasn't she? No wait, don't answer that. First I'm going to read you your rights."

I was halfway through Mirandizing him when I looked up and saw Alex break through the trees on the other side of the creek.

I had the insane urge to throw my suspect onto the ground and run over to her, like we were in some sappy romance movie, but meeting her gaze and seeing her relief was enough.

I finished my recitation as I pushed him along with me, back through the creek to where Alex stood waiting on the other side.

"You're okay?" she asked, slightly out of breath as her eyes tracked over me in search of any visible damage.

"Yeah. How'd you find me?" I asked in amazement.

"I heard the shots from the porch," she answered, tucking her weapon into its holster.

"We're nearly a mile away. It's hasn't been much more than five minutes."

"I ran," she said with a shrug.

"Without your sling," I remarked.

"I don't need it to run," she quipped dismissively. "So what's his story?

"Him? Oh, well, he's innocent."

"Aren't they all?"

"Did you get anything out of Moreno?"

"I got all kinds of good stuff from him," she said, looking pointedly at Randall. "In fact, I think we can go ahead and just charge him right now."

I know her tells, so I knew she was bluffing, but Randall flew into a panic.

"Charge me? You just said you wanted to talk to me! I didn't kill anybody! What did Moreno say? Whatever it is, it's a lie!"

As he yelled, he tried to wrestle away from my grasp, although where he thought he was going to escape to, I have no idea. All he managed to do was land face-first in the mud on the bank of the creek.

"Great," Alex said, rolling her eyes as I hauled him back to his feet. "And we've got to put him in the car like that."

Ten minutes later, we were back at Moreno's house. The ambulance had arrived, along with a black and white, so we showed our badges and explained to them the situation.

They attempted to argue jurisdiction, wanting to arrest Randall for the weapons charge, but Alex put a stop to that.

"We're taking him to New York for suspicion of murder," she said, in that wonderful way of hers that clearly says _and you're an idiot for even questioning that_.

"Suspicion," the officer argued. "We've got him dead to rights on carrying and discharging a firearm."

"Dead to rights?" Alex asked him, and then she looked at me. "Did you see him carrying a weapon?"

"No. I mean, it was in the barn, but it could've been anybody's."

"You said he shot at you!"

"I don't think I said that," I replied, shaking my head.

The officer stared at us disbelievingly, so Alex gave him the consolation prize.

"You can have Moreno."

"On what? Being a drunk low-life? He had a gun on his own property. That's his right."

"I was thinking more along the lines of obstruction," she retorted.

"You know…why is it that New York cops think they're a step above everybody else? You two come into my jurisdiction, waving your guns around, shooting at the citizens of Bloomfield…"

"I called your dispatcher," Alex interrupted. "I asked for backup. So maybe the question that really needs to be answered is why the BPD is so lax and unwilling to assist fellow officers. Do I have to remind you that we tracked a _suspected murderer_ into your jurisdiction? Maybe I need to call your chief so that we can have a discussion about professional courtesy. Because if my partner had been shot while in pursuit of a suspect after we _asked_ for assistance and no one showed up…"

"Okay, Detective," the office spoke up. "You made your point. Randall's all yours."

So I tossed Randall into the back of our SUV while Alex retrieved her handcuffs and her sling.

"Put that back on," I told her firmly as I met her at the back of the vehicle.

"I'm getting it," she replied with barely masked irritation. "You know, I only took it off because I needed both hands."

"I figured that," I said, fighting back a smile as I helped her get the sling into place.

She adjusted her arm and I noticed her catch her breath, but she didn't make a sound.

It was clearly still hurting her and I briefly considered whisking her away to some deserted island for the next few weeks so that her shoulder could properly heal.

"And then I heard the gunshots," she continued.

"And so you handcuffed Moreno to his girlfriend and then ran a mile through the woods trying to find me," I finished.

"You would've done the same thing," she said, finally bringing her eyes to mine.

"Absolutely."

"So don't chastise me about the sling," she said with a smirk.

"I won't as long as you don't fuss at me about my shoes."

We both looked down at my feet, taking in the sight of my ruined three-hundred dollar shoes.

"Those need to go on an expense report," she commented.

"One that we send to the Bloomfield PD."

"I love how much we think alike," she replied, now smiling fully. "Are you ready to take this guy back to the city?"

So we climbed into the vehicle and headed for 1PP.

This was the downside to road trips.

If we managed to apprehend a suspect, then often times we had to make the return trip with someone in the back. There were times when we had assistance with us, and then we could transport the suspect via a black and white, but not this time.

And Randall didn't stop talking for the entire drive.

"So what's your theory?" I asked him, when I finally got a word in edgewise.

"My theory?"

"Who killed Vanessa? And why aren't you a little bit upset about her death? You didn't even report her missing."

"I figured she left. She was mad at me."

"Getting beat up tends to do that to a girl," Alex remarked.

"I didn't beat her up," he insisted lamely. Then he sat back against the seat and sighed and said, "Okay, I did hit her a couple of times. But she always started it."

"That's classic, Jimmy," Alex said sarcastically. "Do you know how many times we hear that?"

"But it's true. She'd just nag at me and call me names and stuff until I couldn't take it any more."

"Did Eva do that, too?" I asked him.

"Who's Eva?"

"Your girlfriend at Bragg. She turned up dead, just like Vanessa."

"What do you know about that?"

"I think the better question is what do you know about it. And why is it that Vanessa was killed in the same manner as Eva? That puts you in a pretty precarious position."

"Just because I knew them both?"

"Because you were sleeping with both. You beat them both. And then you killed them both," Alex clarified.

"You can't prove that," he said sullenly.

I caught Alex's eye and she nodded subtly.

_Can't prove it_ wasn't anywhere close to _I didn't do it_.

It just meant that he thought he was good enough not to get caught.

Well, I had news for him.

"We have a witness," I said. "Someone saw you dump the body in front of the Greek Consulate."

He was quiet for several miles, and I could only imagine that he was replaying the scene in his head, trying to decide if it was possible that someone had seen him.

Again, the fact that he didn't immediately dispute the possibility of a witness was very telling.

If he'd done nothing _wrong_, there could be no witness.

Although, of course, we had no witness. Which was why I'd really like to get the guy to confess. Because we also had no physical evidence tying him to the crime. Not yet, anyway.

"I think I'd better call a lawyer," he said at last.

So maybe he wasn't a complete idiot after all.

We arrived at 1PP and ran into Mike and Carolyn as they were on their way out.

They both looked harried.

"What's up?" Alex asked them.

Mike shifted his eyes to Randall, whose arm I held tightly, and then looked back at us, and simply said, "Connie."

I glanced around quickly and saw an officer I knew heading into the building.

"Daner!" I called out to him as I tugged Randall in his direction.

"Detective Goren," he greeted. "How's your brother-in-law?"

"He's doing great," I answered. "I need a favor. Can you take this guy up to lock up? Give him his phone call so that he can call a lawyer, and we'll be back as soon as we can."

After dumping Randall with Daner, I hustled back over to the others.

"What do we know?" I asked.

"We need to get over to Tenth," Mike said. "They need our help."

The four of us took off down the sidewalk as Carolyn explained the situation.

"Bernard and Hayes retraced her steps, and then started canvassing the businesses along the way. A few people remembered seeing her, and they pieced together some of the route. The trail ended just outside the back entrance of an apartment building over on Tenth."

"It ended?"

"They think he must have had a car parked outside."

"And they arrived at that conclusion how?" Alex asked. "Did someone see them get into a vehicle? Do we have a description?"

"There was blood found in the lobby of the building," Carolyn elaborated. "Not a lot, but some. Droplets showed their progress through the fire exit and onto the sidewalk, and then there were several drops clustered together in a spot at the curb and that's it."

"So he did something to her in the lobby, walked her outside, and then put her into a car."

"That's the consensus."

"Where's Lupo?"

"He and Eames went to the guy's apartment, who by the way is Carl Babbitt, a fellow ADA. The place was clean. Really clean."

"Which means he's got another place," Alex said as we turned the corner, now passing the courthouse. "He had to know he'd be tracked back to there."

"Right. Same deal with the car," Mike said. "His Lexus is still parked at the DA's office, but it's a fancy, noticeable car. He probably bought some piece of crap on the sly, something that's off the books."

"How long has he had her?"

"Ninety minutes."

"Where do they need us?" I asked.

"Bernard and Hayes are checking security footage from a bank on the same street as the building they last exited. They're trying to get a bead on the car. There are four more ATM's on that street, so we thought if we split up, we might be able to find something quicker."

Ninety minutes and she was already bleeding.

I didn't like the sound of that at all.

TBC...


	31. Chapter 31

**Jeremy POV**

* * *

><p>I felt bad about ditching my dad.<p>

As much as my mom wanted me to hate him, I didn't.

And I know, I was a real jackass to him last Saturday, but I had my reasons.

My mom's dick of a boyfriend-slash-husband-slash-ex husband had always acted like he wanted to help me, too.

And then he would bail on me.

He never followed through with anything, and my mom said that Dad was worse. She said that he always put his job first, and that I should never expect help from him unless I wanted to be disappointed.

But still…as soon as the cops had allowed me to make a phone call, I'd called him.

Because I didn't want to believe my mom.

So when my dad showed up in Baltimore, I acted like a jerk to see if he'd quit on me.

But he didn't.

Just that fact alone made me think that there might be light at the end of this black tunnel.

Because I love my dad. I didn't blame him for not wanting to stay with my mom, even though she wanted me to.

She's the one who cheated on him, so I wasn't sure how that became _his_ fault. How everything that had gone wrong in their marriage was his fault.

Although I have to admit that I _was_ surprised to find out that her affair wasn't with Detective Goren. I'd thought that for so long that I hadn't even considered it might be untrue.

So I was shocked when he showed up in the interrogation room. My dad had told me that he'd called his friends for help, but Detective Goren was the last person I was expecting.

Since when was my dad friends with him?

Admittedly, I hadn't spoke much with my dad since I got to JHU. I was trying to make my own way, and I wanted to do well and make him proud of me.

And I wanted to surprise him by telling him that I was going to the academy.

So much for that idea.

But so when Detective Goren walked in, I decided that I needed to push him, too.

I needed to know what kind of man he was, to see if he'd stick it out with me, because I knew that I was in deep, and I didn't want to start holding on to false hope.

But he was just as steadfast as my dad.

He'd treated me like an adult, and then he also told me that he'd never been with my mother.

At first, I wasn't sure whether or not to believe him, but when he mentioned that he was married to his partner…well, then I decided that the man obviously had taste.

Because I'm not going to lie.

At fifteen, I went through a phase when I fantasized about Detective Eames _a lot_.

So if he'd managed to snag a woman like her, then he wouldn't look twice at my mother.

And maybe that sounds mean.

I mean, she _is_ my mother.

But she's bitter and hostile and self-centered and I couldn't wait to go to college so that I could get out from under her thumb.

A while back, my dad started dating Liz. I met her a couple of times, back in the early stages of their relationship, and she was so…I don't know.

Nice.

So _not_ my mother.

That's why I went to her when I had that freaking STD scare. I figured it would be a good time to feel her out.

She didn't go ballistic like most parents would. She just let me talk and she listened.

And then she lectured me a little, but she's a doctor, so I figured she knew what she was talking about.

Aside from that, I'm pretty sure she never told my dad.

Since then, I tried to make a point to keep in touch with her. I felt a little guilty about the fact that, in my head, I compared her to my mom, but I couldn't help it.

And Liz always came out ahead.

So I was pretty ticked at my dad when the two of them broke up, but then he made it right and ended up marrying her.

I wished they would've gotten together sooner, because then I would've asked about living with them instead of with my mom, but I was already at JHU so it was a moot point. I suggested it to Aaron, but he was in his last year of school, so he stuck it out.

And of course, my mom also insisted that my dad wouldn't want to have anything to do with either of us.

I should've known she was lying.

Because now he'd taken me in, while I was in the middle of this unbelievable crisis, and he'd been pretty cool about it all.

I mean, yeah, he yelled when he first got to Baltimore, but looking back on it, I think he was just scared for me.

Since then, he's been really great.

I haven't talked much, but he and Liz treat me like I'm part of the family.

It was weird seeing the two of them together in a domestic situation. He was really sweet to her, and they were affectionate with each other. I'd never in my life seen him act like that with my mom, even back when they supposedly still loved each other.

I don't know if my mom just brought out the worst in him, or if Liz brought out the best, but whatever the case, and despite the horrible circumstances, I was grateful that I was getting the chance to know him better.

And he _wasn't_ putting his job first.

He'd called in a favor with his best two detectives.

He'd taken a day off of work to bring me down to the funeral, even though I'd never even told him about her.

Kelly.

Every time I thought about her it was like there was a knife in my chest and I felt like I couldn't breathe.

I'd never told her that I loved her, but I did. I _do_.

I really thought that we'd be together, even after college.

And it didn't escape me that she was a lot like I imagined Liz had been in college.

Out-spoken, bright, driven, and very down to earth.

And I was apparently like my father.

We could've been the next generation of Chief married to doctor.

But instead, she'd been killed.

On the drive down from New York, I remembered who else had been in the room with me and Kelly.

Which was why I'd had to risk my newly improved relationship with my father.

Because if I told him, then he'd tell the police. And they may or may not believe him, they may or may not make an arrest, and there may or may not be charges.

To me, that was unacceptable.

Kelly was dead.

I wanted payback.

I wanted to get a confession and an explanation.

And I was going to get it by any means necessary.

I got to the campus about half an hour after leaving the cemetery. My phone had rung once, but I'd silenced it and then turned it off.

I paused outside of the dormitory and considered what I was about to do.

My initial plan hadn't been very well thought out. I needed to regroup and be a little more creative or I was going to wind up back behind bars.

I could use some help.

I thought over my choices, guys I'd become friends with since moving to Baltimore, but no one jumped out at me.

In fact, I'd pretty much been left swinging in the breeze since last Friday night. I was basically a pariah now, and I didn't trust anyone to have my back.

But I did know who to call for a little moral support.

So I pulled out my phone and turned it on, ignoring the flashing light that indicated voice mail messages.

And then I called my little brother.

"Where are you, man?" he asked as he answered the phone. "Dad called here a few minutes ago and he's freakin' out."

"It's all good, bro," I promised. "So Dad called you?"

"Yeah, he wanted to know if you'd called me. He said you ditched him in B'more."

"I think I know who it was, A."

"You got your memory back? Why didn't you just tell Dad? You know he'd be all over it."

"I need to do it," I told him.

"I hear you," he said calmly. "Can you wait six hours? I'll get your back."

I smiled and fought the sudden and irrational urge to cry.

"You're not coming down here and doing something that might mess up your graduation," I said in a voice that sounded strangely like my father's. "Just sit tight, and I'll call you when I'm done, okay?"

"Hey, I got the letter today."

"You got in?"

"NYU, bro."

"Well, now I've gotta get in because I can't let my little brother one-up me, can I?"

"You'll get in," he said confidently. "Hey, man, I'm sorry I couldn't be there today. For Kelly's funeral, I mean. Mom…"

"It's okay," I assured him.

My mother had refused to let Aaron come. I think she wondered if maybe I really was the killer.

I'd wondered that briefly myself, but deep down, I knew there was no way.

"Be careful," he said to me. "Don't do anything stupid."

"Me?" I asked, trying to make a joke out of it.

"You. I expect to see you at my graduation, right?"

"I'll be there. And I'll call you later tonight, okay? Or maybe tomorrow. Whenever I can finish this."

I hung up with Aaron feeling a lot better about what I was about to do.

He and I had grown really close over the past several years. Ever since Mom had started dating Todd the dick.

I'd decided that someone needed to be a visible role model for Aaron.

I mean, Dad was like this goal that we wanted to someday achieve. Aaron wanted to be a cop, too.

But Dad wasn't around enough to teach Aaron how to be a man, so I'd taken that upon myself, even though admittedly I still had a lot to learn, too.

Leaving him had been the hardest part about going away to college, but we'd kept in fairly close contact, and I'd encouraged him to hit the books hard.

His studying had paid off, and now maybe we'd both be going to NYU, if I could get approved for a transfer.

I put Aaron out of my mind for now and instead sent a text to my dad. The fact that he'd called looking for me made me feel even worse about leaving him in the dark.

I didn't want him to worry about me.

_**I'm okay, but there's something I have to do. Don't be mad. Go back to New York, and I'll take the train home tomorrow. **_

As soon as the message sent, I turned off my phone and then I walked around to the edge of campus and sat down on a bench.

I needed to think this through.

If I screwed this up, I could very well blow my chances of ever becoming a cop.

If my chances weren't already blown.

How did I want it to end?

What would my father do?

_He would've never gotten into this situation in the first place._

But that wasn't true, was it?

For the longest time, I thought that he was this perfect person who never made mistakes, but over the past week, I'd started to see that he _did_ screw up from time to time.

And the measure of a man wasn't the mistakes he made, but what he did _next_.

So what was I going to do next?

I pondered possible scenarios, and finally came up with a plan.

I turned on my cell phone again so that I could put the plan into action, and I saw that I had two text messages from my dad and one from Liz.

_**Let us help you. If you've remembered something, let's take it to the cops.**_

_**We're staying in Baltimore. Call if you need us for anything at all.**_

_**Be careful. We love you. **_

And the last one wasn't from Liz. Hers was the one in the middle.

The last one was from my dad.

I was seriously tempted to text him back, or to call him…something.

But I had to do this on my own, so I got the information that I needed from my phone, and then I turned it off and stuck it back into my pocket.

I was going to have to kill some time until dark, but that was fine.

When all was said and done, I was going to get a confession.

TBC...


	32. Chapter 32

**Lupo POV**

* * *

><p>Mulder was beside himself.<p>

He'd been halfway through his hot dog when he stopped, mid-bite, and got up and ran back to Cutter's office.

I followed him, since his intensity had caught my attention. After witnessing him alternately type and curse for several minutes, he'd looked up at me with concern.

_"I'm sorry, man."_

_"What is it?"_

_"I got it wrong."_

_"Got what wrong?"_ Cutter asked, having just arrived in the doorway.

"_The height. I didn't take into account that on that street, the sidewalk on the other side is lower, creating the illusion that the perpetrator was shorter than he actually is."_

_"So he's not five-seven,"_ I stated, just as Cutter's phone began to ring.

_"Cutter,"_ he answered, but I only partially heard him as Mulder answered my question.

_"Five-nine,"_ he said.

_"Okay,"_ I told him with a nod. _"Okay, it's fine. Five-nine. So when the pictures come out from the footage, we'll adjust our parameters…"_

_"What do you mean?"_ Cutter said loudly into the phone. Then he looked at me and asked, "_How long ago did Connie leave?"_

_"Um…twenty minutes. Why?"_ I asked, although things were starting to click into place.

_He's my height_, Connie had said about Carl.

Her height.

Five-nine.

_"Neither she nor Carl has shown up in court,"_ Cutter said as he put down the phone.

It only took a split-second for his words to sink in, and then I dashed out of the office. Eames was hot on my heels, and I yelled out my update to him while I simultaneously descended the stairs and dialed Connie's phone.

That was more than an hour ago.

And Mulder's distress was nothing compared to mine.

"There's nothing here," Eames said to me in frustration as we continued to search through Carl's apartment.

And he was right.

The place was completely devoid of anything personal.

I mean, sure, there were clothes in the closet. Food in the refrigerator. Books on the shelf.

But there were no pictures. No papers. No electronics, other than the small TV set in the living room.

"He's got to have another place," I muttered. "Some place off the books."

"So if it's off the books, how are we supposed to find it?"

Good question.

I was trying hard not to panic. I needed to think about this rationally.

And I'd taught Connie well, right?

I told her to wait for the right moment.

I told her to go along with his fantasy, as much as she could.

And I told her that as soon as she had an opportunity, to go for the soft spots.

"_Soft spots?"_ she'd asked me, her voice a quiet tease and her expression playful.

"_Not just the groin,"_ I answered, knowing that's where her mind had gone. _"Believe it or not, that's not the only vulnerable spot. Go for the eyes, the nose, the throat…and don't just hit him once. If you get the chance to hurt him, keep after him until he goes down. You need to make sure that you give yourself time to get away, because once you attack him and it _doesn't_ work, the situation becomes that much more dangerous."_

"_So you want me to be aggressive,"_ she concluded.

"_I want you to be ruthless,"_ I amended. And then I'd held my finger up against her throat. "_What if this was a knife? What would you do?"_

She hadn't been sure, so I'd shown her a couple of options. And after I felt sure that she was comfortable with the maneuvers, I'd attacked her again, only in a different, much more pleasurable way.

Although now I was regretting letting my desire get the better of me.

I should've spent more time with her, working on how to defend herself and how to escape a captor.

I should've insisted that she carry a weapon of some sort.

I should've…

"Hey, Lupo!" Eames called out to me.

I'd been looking through Carl's dresser drawers, but I stepped out of the bedroom and went down the hall in search of Eames.

"You found something?" I asked.

I really hoped that he had.

Bernard had called a few minutes ago to let me know that they were still tracking her.

"_How?"_ I'd asked him.

We'd already checked her GPS and discovered that it had been disabled.

"_There were a few witnesses,"_ he said carefully.

"_And?"_

"_And a little blood."_

"_How little?"_ I asked as my own blood ran cold.

"_A little,"_ he'd repeated firmly. _"Mike and Carolyn are going to help us go through ATM camera footage and see if we can get a glimpse of whatever car he used to take her away. Hang in there, Lupes."_

Since then, he'd sent me a text to say that the Gorens were helping out, too.

So now we had eight detectives working the case.

I wondered if Ross would catch any backlash for having a third of his department all working on one missing persons case, but honestly, at this point, I didn't care.

I'd apologize to him _after_ we found her.

Hell, I'd even give him my badge if he needed it so that the department could save face.

I just needed her back, safe and sound.

"Check it out," Eames said, holding out a piece of paper that he'd found in the pocket of a coat hanging in a closet near the front door.

"What is it?" I asked as I took it from his hand.

"It's a receipt. For…um…"

"Duct tape," I finished as I read the words.

And Carl didn't seem like a fix-it kind of guy.

"But look where he bought it," Eames said, pointing at the header on the receipt.

It was from a hardware store in Queens.

"Why go all the way to Queens when there's one right down the block?" he added. "And he works in Manhattan, too, so…"

"So maybe it's near his other place," I said with a nod. "Okay…okay, we can maybe work with this. Let's go to this store and see if the clerk there remembers him."

The date on the receipt showed that he'd just made the purchase on Sunday.

_After_ watching us in action in Baltimore.

Had seeing us together pushed him over the edge?

Or was it just that he was afraid we were closing in on him?

Whatever the case, he'd obviously escalated beyond the point of no return.

He'd kidnapped her.

There was no coming back from this.

Which meant that he was going to do whatever he could, by any means necessary, to follow through with his fantasy.

* * *

><p><strong>Connie POV<strong>

Carl surprised me by having duct tape on the floorboard of his old beat-up Chevy. I could see it as soon as he opened the door, the lone object on the floor mat.

"Pick it up," he instructed as he shoved me across the seat from the driver's side door and then proceeded to climb in after me.

Was this my moment?

I was several inches away from him now, so the knife wasn't an immediate danger. I could probably get out the passenger side door…

The thought barely crossed my mind before I put it into action.

I jerked up on the door lock and then grabbed for the handle, scooting myself across the seat as quickly as I could while trying to open the door at the same time.

That was when I heard the click.

The hammer being cocked on a revolver.

"I said pick up the duct tape," he repeated sharply. I had already pulled the handle and the door was ajar, but it was too late.

Apparently this _wasn't_ my moment.

Because he'd had a gun stashed beneath the driver's seat.

"You disappoint me, Connie. Why are you trying to run away? I'm trying to _save_ you, can't you see that?"

"Saving doesn't usually involve duct tape," I retorted as I slowly bent down to pick up the roll.

The stab wound to my stomach was a dull, steady ache and the blood was coming out fairly consistently.

I hoped that it had gotten on the floor.

I thought that maybe I had, but I didn't want to look and risk calling Carl's attention to it.

"I need to close the door," I told him as he started the engine.

He kept the gun on his lap, but it still had the hammer back and it was still pointed at me.

There was no way, even if I threw myself out of the car, that I'd make it without getting shot.

And at this range, the risk of a shot being fatal was pretty high.

_Be patient_, Lupo's voice reminded me.

"You shouldn't have opened it in the first place," he chastised as he reached over into my jacket pocket and pulled out my cell phone. He glanced at the display.

"Thirteen missed calls," he mused, tucking it into his own pocket. "Someone's a little frantic, huh? You think he knows that he's not good enough for you? You think he suspects that you've run away with me?"

I didn't respond to his ridiculous questions. Instead, I held the duct tape in my left hand and I settled my right hand on the seat beside me so that it was out of his line of sight.

I worked quickly so that I'd be ready when he gave me the go-ahead to properly close the door.

He stared at me for a moment and then he finally nodded his head.

"Fine. Carefully open it up and then close it. If you make one move to get out of this car, I'll shoot you dead, I can promise you that."

"You would really kill me?" I asked him, stalling for time since I wasn't quite ready yet. "I thought you loved me."

"I do. Which means that no one else can have you. Ever. Do you hear me?"

I nodded and then he said, "Go on. Close the door and then you're going to get busy with that tape."

So I reached out and pushed open the door, opening it fully and then slamming it closed.

And in the process, I let my bracelet fall to the ground.

I'd been working to get my fingers beneath it so that I could break the clasp, and I'd managed just in time.

It was the best I could do to offer a bread crumb trail.

I knew there was only a remote possibility that it would be found, but if Lupo managed to track me this far, it would be solid evidence that I'd been here, in the road, which hopefully would suggest to him that I'd gotten into a car.

Maybe.

I don't know.

Or maybe I'd just tossed my Valentine's Day present into the street for no good reason.

"That's good," Carl said once I'd shut the door. "Now pull off a strip of tape and use it to secure your ankles together."

"Why would you want me to do that? Then I won't be able to walk. What are you going to do, carry me inside when we get to wherever we're going?"

"You let me worry about that. And do it tight. I'm going to check it after you finish."

So I bent down in the seat and spent a minute or so wrapping tape around my ankles.

And then, as directed, I taped my own wrists. It wasn't an easy thing to do, and it took me a few minutes to get the hang of it, but I managed to make several circuits around my wrists in a messy manner.

While I taped myself, I covertly watched out the window as he drove us over into Brooklyn and then pulled down a side street and stopped the car.

He looked around for a few minutes, presumably to make sure the coast was clear, and then he pointed the gun at me and said, "Don't move. Got it?"

"Okay."

He got out of the car and opened the trunk and then walked around to my side.

I guess he was smart after all, because if I didn't have my ankles taped together, I would've run away in a second.

As it was, I would've probably ended up flat on my face in the street if I'd attempted an escape.

He opened my car door and grabbed the tape, making a few more passes on both my ankles and wrists and then he threw the roll in the back.

"It's not much further," he said as he pulled me out of the car. I stood awkwardly next to the door and then he picked me up and carried me around to the trunk where he gently set me down inside.

I didn't want to be in the trunk.

And I mean I _desperately_ didn't want to be in here.

My predecessor at the DA's office had died in a trunk.

My plea was on the tip of my tongue but then I stopped.

I wasn't going to beg him for anything.

I could handle a ride in the trunk. And maybe it would give me some privacy to work on staging my escape.

Carl looked at me expectantly as though he'd anticipated me offering an entreaty, but I stayed quiet.

Then I saw his eyes track over me slowly, pausing near my mid-section. I thought that he finally realized how much I was bleeding, but instead, he grabbed my hand and picked it up.

"You don't need this anymore," he said as he tugged on my engagement ring.

The tape around my wrists had caused my fingers to swell a little and the ring didn't want to come off, but that didn't stop him.

He continued to pull until I thought my whole finger was going to be torn from my hand, and then he stopped and pulled out his knife.

"Wait, wait, wait," I said quickly. "Let me get it."

He paused with his knife hovering near my hand and then he nodded at me.

"Even better. You take it off."

It took me a minute, but I got the ring off, and he quickly took it from me and shoved it in his pocket. I was glad to see that he'd done that instead of tossing it, because this way when Lupo caught him, I could get it back.

And Lupo _would_ catch him.

"Stay quiet, and I'll get you out as soon as I can. If you start screaming, I'll just shoot a bullet through the backseat, okay?"

"Okay," I agreed, grateful that he wasn't going to put tape over my mouth.

Although maybe I'd rather he would have since the next thing he did was lean over to kiss me. I kept my lips tightly closed and moved my head to the side in an effort to get away, but he reached in and grabbed the back my head, holding me still.

"Get used to it. You like it rough? I'll show you rough. Tonight, I'll make you forget all about your hero boy. Although, I guess he's not so heroic after all, huh?"

He backed off and slammed the trunk closed, leaving me in total darkness.

_Don't panic_, I warned myself.

I couldn't waste any time because I had no idea how far away he was taking me, so I immediately went to work on the duct tape.

His worst mistake had been to let me have my hands in front of me. That meant I could easily use my own fingers to get through the tape on my ankles.

It took longer than I'd hoped, but I managed to free my feet. My hands were another story. I could only pick at the edges with my fingernails and I couldn't get a good enough angle to make much progress.

But I didn't let that sway my determination.

This was going to be my moment. When he opened the trunk to get me out, I'd have something for him.

_Go for the soft spots_, Lupo had told me.

I'd go for the soft spots, alright.

I went over my plan in my head as I bounced around in the trunk of the old Chevy for countless miles.

And then it stopped.

What if we were in the middle of nowhere?

What if I ran but had nowhere to go?

What if he opened the trunk while aiming the gun at my head?

Fear flooded through me, but I tamped it down.

The only thing that might make me change my mind was the gun.

But even if he had it with him, as long as it was pointed anywhere other than directly at me, I was still going to have to make my move.

I couldn't risk getting tied up in some abandoned warehouse.

I'd seen too many crime scene photos. I knew exactly what happened to women in that kind of situation.

I listened to his footsteps as he walked around to the back of the car. I was scooted far back in the trunk so that my legs would have room to maneuver.

I knew that I'd be momentarily blinded by the sunlight, but I couldn't let that stop me.

I heard the scrape of the key in the lock.

And then he opened the trunk.

TBC...


	33. Chapter 33

**Lupo POV**

* * *

><p>"Where are you, Detective?"<p>

"On my way to Queens," I told Cutter. "We found a receipt for duct tape purchased at a hardware store on Parsons, but we haven't found any other reason for Carl to be in that area."

"Still nothing from her GPS?"

"No. It's my guess that he managed to disable it, maybe while they were in court. She wouldn't have thought twice about him looking at her cell phone."

"Your guy's been working on our system. A virus was remotely uploaded about twenty minutes ago."

"What kind of virus?"

"I don't know, but Mulder was pretty excited about it. He stalled the progression of the virus itself and now he's trying to backtrack its origin. He seems to think it was triggered from a cell phone."

That was definitely good news.

We'd already checked Carl's cell, and of course, it had been turned off, but if he was using another, one that he thought we didn't know about, then maybe we could track him that way.

"So he's working on that?"

"He's pretty tore up about missing the height factor. He feels personally responsible."

"I don't blame him for that. We wouldn't have even known about the DA connection if it weren't for him."

"That's what I said, but I don't think he was listening. Oh, hang on."

I sat back against the passenger seat while Cutter had me on hold.

I'd let Eames drive the car, knowing that I wasn't in the right frame of mind to maneuver a thirty-five hundred pound hunk of metal.

"That's it right there," I said to Eames, pointing through the windshield. The sign on the storefront stated Craig's Hardware.

"Why buy from a store like this?" Eames questioned as he slammed the car to a stop next to a fire hydrant. "It's small. The guy's probably going to remember him."

"It might not do us any good," I pointed out. "Carl paid cash. The clerk remembering him will only confirm the fact that Carl himself is the one who made the purchase. Unless they started up a conversation about where he lives…"

"Let's find out."

I was still waiting for Cutter, so I kept the phone to my ear as Eames and I headed into the hardware store.

I'd already had Carl's DMV photo sent to both of our phones, so Eames pulled his out and brought up the picture as we approached the counter.

"NYPD," Eames said, showing his badge. "Have you seen this man?"

"Sure," the guy replied. "That's David Camden."

"David Camden," I repeated, holding out the receipt. "You're positive? He bought duct tape from you last Sunday?"

"Well, I wasn't working last Sunday, so I can't say for sure, but he shops in here from time to time so it's likely."

"What else has he bought recently?" Eames asked as Cutter came back onto the phone.

"Lupo, you there?"

"Yeah, what've you got?"

"The transmission of the phone uploading the virus bounced off a tower near the LIE."

"Give me the number, and I'll run it," I said, still partially listening to the hardware store owner.

"He's working on some kind of home improvement project, I think. Sheetrock, finishing nails, insulation…"

"Did you ask him about it?"

"We chatted about it some, but nothing specific."

"Did he give you any idea as to where he lives? A neighborhood maybe, or a street?"

"Lupo," Mulder said, apparently having taken the phone from Cutter. "Dude, don't get mad."

"I'm not mad," I insisted. "I just need that number."

"That's what I don't want you to get mad about, dude, okay? I already ran it."

"You pulled the activity on a cell phone? No, never mind. Give me what you've got."

I wasn't going to argue the letter of the law when Connie's life was at stake. And with Cutter standing right there next to him…we'd figure something out.

"Okay, dude, check it. The only time he used it was when your man Cutter said, near the LIE. He must have turned it on and sent the email trigger and then turned it back off. But get this…I went in through a trapdoor and flipped his GPS, right?"

"You're picking up a signal?" I nearly shouted as I clenched onto the counter with one hand. Eames and the hardware guy glanced at me, but then kept talking.

"Yeah, dude, get this. I'm looking at him on a map _right now_."

"Where?"

"He's moving east on Martense, heading towards 108th. Give me two minutes, and I'll send the track to your phone. That helps, right? I mean, dude…"

"Mulder, you're a fucking genius," I said gratefully as I hung up my phone and then anxiously awaited the program to appear.

The old guy was still talking, but I grabbed Eames by the arm and headed for the front door.

"Van Cleef, maybe?" the guy called after us. "Or Van Doren! One of those!"

"Call Bernard," I barked out to Eames as we got into the car. "Tell him to pull everything he can find on David Camden. Place of residence, vehicle registration, everything."

"So where are we going?"

"Mulder sent a GPS to my phone," I said as the program magically came to life on my cell phone. "He figured out a way to track him."

It took me a moment to acclimate myself to the blue flashing blip on the map, but as soon as I had it, excitement rolled through me.

We were _close_.

* * *

><p><strong>Connie POV<strong>

My first kick hit the underneath side of the trunk lid.

Obviously, that wasn't my intent, but he'd opened the lid much slower than I'd expected.

But that was fine.

Because I didn't stop there.

"_Once you go on the attack, absolutely do not stop," _Lupo had said to me no less than a dozen times. _"He might bleed or beg or maybe your blow doesn't land where you'd hoped, but no matter what, keep going after him."_

And the blow _hadn't_ gone where I'd hoped, but it had forced the trunk lid open to full capacity and it had startled him for a split second, so I kicked him again and the second one caught him in the side of the head.

He staggered sideways a step and I managed to get myself out of the trunk, but in the process, I fell down onto my knees.

He lunged after me and grabbing me from behind, taking both of us down to the ground. My hands were trapped beneath me and I was suddenly swamped with a sense of panic.

I was blowing it.

This was exactly what Lupo had warned me against.

"I can't believe you just did that," he grumbled as he scrambled to get me under control.

"I'm sorry," I cried out, faking compliance and ignoring the pain of the gravel surface digging into my face and hands, as well as into the wound on my stomach.

"Sorry for what?" he asked challengingly.

I stopped fighting him and instead laid still as he finally sat back on my butt, with his legs straddling either side of me.

"I'm sorry I kicked you. I was scared. The trunk…"

"And you're not going to try that again?"

"No, I promise," I insisted.

I waited as he took in several deep breaths, and I took the opportunity to look at my surroundings as best as I could.

It looked like we were in a driveway, and there were trees on either side of us.

He'd backed the car into it so that now there was a garage on one side of us and the car was on the other. The car was also serving to block our scuffle from view of anyone who might be on the street.

"I'm not going to put up with insubordination, Connie," he chastised.

He remained seated on top of me, which told me something else. He felt fairly secure in our location. He wasn't worried about neighbors spotting us.

When I'd first kicked him, I still had my shoes on because I'd wanted the extra oomph that the shoes would offer, but now as I lay prone on the driveway, I carefully slid them off of my feet.

If it was going to turn into a foot race, I wasn't going to do it wearing heels.

I'd feel a lot better if I knew where he'd stashed the gun.

Was it in the car?

Or did he have it on him?

Logic would say that if he had it on him, he would've pulled it out so that he could better subdue me, but maybe he liked me fighting him.

He definitely seemed to enjoy our wrestling match, and considering he'd mentioned rough sex, I thought that maybe the physical contact was turning him on.

That was fine. I could work with that.

Now that my shoes were off, I put up a small struggle, just to make it seem realistic and to possibly distract him.

"You promised," he reminded me sternly. "I'm not getting up until you settle down."

"You're hurting me," I told him helplessly.

"Then be a good girl and stop fighting me."

I squirmed for another moment, and then went still.

After a full minute, he moved off of me and helped me to my feet.

"You lost your shoes," he stated.

"They slipped off."

"Put them back on."

As he said the words, he took a few steps away from me and then pulled the gun from his coat pocket.

"Now," he added, since I hadn't made a move to retrieve my shoes.

I didn't care about the gun any more.

Getting shot would be preferable to what he was probably going to do to me.

_It's now or never_, I told myself.

So I made a move toward my shoes, and then I stopped, tossing into his face the gravel that I'd grabbed before he'd jerked me to my feet.

He ducked against the onslaught of the unknown, and I kicked him in the arm, knocking the gun from his hand.

And then I made a break for it.

But he recovered more quickly than I'd expected and as I took off around the side of the car, he came after me. He managed to grab onto my jacket that was flapping out behind me.

My momentum stalled, so I whirled around and hit him with my bound hands, catching him first in the side of the head and then again in the nose. He fell backwards from the blows, but he didn't let go of me so I brought my knee up into his groin and then hit him again in the head with my hands. He finally released my jacket as he fell to his knees.

_Don't let up_, I reminded myself.

So I didn't.

I kicked him repeatedly in the ribs, unleashing all of my anger and frustration from the past several weeks brought on by having to deal with his mysterious taunts and threats.

He curled up into the fetal position as I continued to pummel him with my hands and my feet, and then he suddenly brought out one hand, and in it he held his knife.

He swiped the blade across my foot, catching me as I attempted yet another kick, and when I retreated, he slowly began to get to his feet.

Now was definitely the time to run.

Although, now I had an injured foot that was bleeding worse than my stomach, but I couldn't worry about that for the time being.

I just had to find help.

As he put the hand holding the knife on the car in an effort to steady himself, I took one last swipe at him with my hands. The blow threw him off balance and he sprawled out over top of the hood, but I didn't watch anymore after that.

Instead, I took off down the driveway and out onto the road.

I couldn't see anything in either direction, but I turned right and began running down the middle of the road as fast as I could.

* * *

><p><strong>Lupo POV<strong>

"Stop the car!" I yelled as we barreled around a curve and very nearly ran over my soon-to-be wife.

Eames slammed on the brakes and the car skidded sideways as Connie jumped for the edge of the street in an effort to avoid getting hit.

Minutes ago, I'd heard from Bernard, who was at this moment heading towards Queens, along with the Logans and the Gorens, all of whom were ready to descend upon the home of David Camden.

He apparently had a whole, second identity set up and he lived about a mile away from the spot where we found Connie.

Without waiting for the car to completely stop, I got out of the passenger seat and ran over to the side of the road.

"I did what you said," she told me, although I could barely hear her since I'd grabbed her into my arms and was currently smashing her face against my chest. Her hands were bound in front of her, so she couldn't hug me back, but I didn't care.

I'd been so afraid that I might never see her alive again.

"I'm okay," she said. "Go get him."

"I'm not leaving you…"

"Go get him," she repeated. "He can't hurt me now."

I pulled back from her, bringing my hands to her face, and then I looked her in the eye.

She was bloody and dirty, but determined and was standing strong.

But still…I couldn't send Eames alone to Carl's and I didn't want to leave Connie standing on the side of the road unprotected.

What if he managed to circle around and catch up to her?

So I did the only thing I could think of.

I pulled out my knife and cut through the tape that was securing her wrists together.

Then I put that away and got out my back-up piece.

I guided her to stand next to a large elm, and said, "Keep your back to this tree. If you see Carl, shoot him. Okay?"

As I spoke, I clicked off the safety and pulled back on the slide so that there was a round loaded in the chamber.

"It's ready to go, so be careful," I said as I handed her the weapon. "I'll be right back."

I was afraid if I hesitated any longer, I would change my mind altogether, so after giving her instructions, I ran back to the car.

Eames had righted the vehicle while I'd been talking with Connie, so as soon as my butt hit the seat, we were flying towards Carl's house.

But we were still too late.

He must have ditched as soon as Connie escaped, and considering the distance that she'd run…he probably had at least a ten minute head start.

I pulled out my phone and issued an APB on Carl's vehicle.

"There's blood over here," Eames called out to me as we searched the area. "Scuffle marks in the gravel…we're definitely in the right place."

The blip on the GPS was stuck on our location, which meant his phone was here somewhere.

"Let's get CSU out here to document the scene," I said. "We need to at least pretend like there's still a book."

Eames gave me a nod and made the necessary call while I called Bernard.

"She got away," I said when he answered. "Where are you?"

"A couple of miles out."

"I found her on the road, about a mile away. I left her my backup piece and came after Carl, but he's gone. We're getting CSU to come out, but I'm heading back your way shortly. Stop and stay with her, okay? I'm going to do a quick search of the house, and then I'll be there."

I hoped to find something in Carl's home that would lead us to him, but I didn't.

Instead it was filled to the brim with electronic equipment. This was obviously where he spent most of his time, at least since he'd turned into a fulltime stalker. I was going to have Mulder comb through the computers and hopefully he'd turn up something.

I also found the room that Carl had been working on. It was about ten feet square, and was located next to his bedroom. There were no windows or external walls, and the room had been soundproofed. There was a sink and a toilet along the far wall, and there was a mattress on the floor. Several feet of heavy chain were on the mattress and there were cast iron eyelets positioned randomly along the floor and walls.

It was a dungeon.

And it was nearly complete.

Carl overhearing that we were closing in on the stalker must have made him jump the gun on his plan.

I didn't like the idea of him still being on the loose, but at least now we knew who we were dealing with.

There was no longer the threat of it could be _anyone_, but was instead just the uncertainty of where he might pop up next.

I'd planned to wait for CSU to arrive, since that was protocol, but the Gorens and the Logans showed up about ten minutes after I'd placed the call to Bernard.

"Go," Alex said to me. "We've got this."

"Are you sure?"

She just raised her eyebrow at me and pushed me in the direction of the door, so I ran back to the car and, leaving Eames behind, drove like a maniac back to Connie.

She was laying down in the grass and Hayes was bent over next to her. Bernard was crouched down near her feet.

"Is she okay?" I called out as I hopped out of the car.

"She's fine, Lupes. A little light-headed. She's got some cuts and bruises, and it looks like she'll need some stitching up, so I called a bus. It should be here any minute."

"She's just giving me her statement," Hayes added. "I thought we could get it out of the way so that once you two are done at the hospital, you can just go home."

I nodded and went around to the other side of Connie where I sat down next to her and picked up her hand, waiting patiently while she finished talking to Hayes.

When she finished, she turned her eyes to mine and said, "He took my ring."

Her voice cracked as she said the words, and it was the first time I saw evidence of emotion. And as much as it upset me to see _her_ upset, it was a good thing.

Otherwise, I would've been worried about shock.

"It's okay," I promised, bringing her bloody knuckles to my lips. "I'll buy you another one."

"But that one was your grandmother's."

"Connie, I don't care about that."

"He didn't throw it out," she said as she stared at me pointedly. "He put it in his pocket. He still has it. Or at least he did when I got away."

"Well, then," I said with a slow nod. "I'll just make sure that I get it back."

TBC...


	34. Chapter 34

**Hayes POV**

* * *

><p>By the time I got home, I was exhausted.<p>

Although admittedly it was probably just as much from emotional stress as physical exertion.

Connie had escaped her stalker kidnapper.

And I broke up with Bernard.

Well, if what we'd been doing was enough to classify _not_ doing it any more as a break up.

And now suddenly I couldn't wait to go back to the 2-7.

I recognized that it would be the same thing as running away, but I couldn't help it.

How was I supposed to face him on a daily basis after this?

He wanted me to talk to him and I just couldn't do it, because then one of two things would happen.

He'd either convince me that it didn't matter while on the inside he was horrified and disappointed to learn the truth.

Or he'd say _yeah, you're right – you _are_ too damaged_.

And even though option two would still land us where we were right now – _not_ together – at least now I could perpetuate the fantasy in my mind.

Because if I ever heard him actually say those words, I'm not sure I'd ever recover.

"I've seen happier people on death row."

I looked up as I climbed the steps of my apartment building and found Mary sitting at the top. She had a beer in her hand and two more bottles sitting next to her.

"What are you doing here?" I asked her.

"I live here, remember?"

"Already?"

"Don't sound so excited. Yeah, apparently the manager really likes you. The apartment I was looking at won't be ready until May, but he had another one whose potential new tenant changed her mind and it's already vacant, so…yeah."

"So why are you sitting out here instead of inside unpacking?"

"I'm acclimating to my environment," she said with a smile. "Actually, I've had a lot on my mind today, and it's a nice night, so I took a break and brought the bar outside with me. Want a beer? You look like you could use one."

"You have no idea," I said dejectedly as I took the beer and sat down next to her, and then I told her what had happened with Connie.

"She kicked the crap out of the guy, huh?"

"Yes, she did," I said.

_That's because she's strong_, I told myself bitterly.

She'd fought back.

She'd refused to allow herself to become a victim.

"I knew there was a reason why I like her," Mary mused, her voice cutting through my self-flagellation.

"She played it really cool," I said admirably. "She had to get a few stitches in her stomach and some in her foot, but overall…it certainly could've turned out a lot worse. Of course, we still have to catch the guy, but at least now we know who he is."

"You think he's in the wind?"

"If he's smart he is. Because if Lupo catches him…"

"Uh huh. That's kind of what I was thinking. So, where's Bernard? I was kind of hoping to bust you two engaging in some kind of illicit activities," she said with a smirk.

"He went home, I guess," I answered, doing my best to sound ambivalent.

"Sounds like you might need another beer," she said, picking up another bottle and holding it out to me. "So, spill it."

"Oh, that's okay," I argued.

"Hey, remember what I said about bitching and moaning? Well, it goes both ways. I happen to listen to it just as well as I give it, so let's hear it."

"I broke it off with Bernard today," I finally admitted.

If anyone had asked me ten minutes ago to talk about my day, I'd have said no way in hell.

I just wanted to escape to my apartment with a bottle of wine next to me and Janis in my lap.

I wanted to lick my wounds and feel sorry for myself.

But somehow Mary's offer was exactly what I needed.

She would be unbiased.

And Mary was almost painfully honest.

If I was being stupid, she'd tell me.

But I was pretty sure that wasn't the case. I mean, I was protecting Bernard, right?

Because I _did_ care about him.

"Broke it off," she repeated thoughtfully. "So I guess you two progressed since last Friday night."

So I filled her in on the past six days.

And maybe I got a little carried away and offered more detail than was necessary, but she didn't seem to mind.

"So after the thing with Carolyn, it really got me thinking about how tough it is to handle another person's past, you know?" I concluded.

"Maybe, but that's not really a good reason to break up with someone. I mean, John has a past. He's done things that…I don't know. I try not to even think about. But it's all in the past so why should I let it change how I feel about him?"

"But see that's just it. None of his past is still hanging around."

"Well, now you've lost me. You have a past that's still part of your present? Are you married or something? Kids?"

"No," I answered quickly and then I took a long sip from my beer. I could use about twelve more of these but I was already drinking her last one.

Although there was a bodega just down the street…

"Without more information, my conclusion is that you're an idiot," she said firmly.

"What?"

"I'm serious. He's a great guy, and you two are extremely compatible, and he really likes you and you really like him and you just admitted that the sex is phenomenal, so…I'm not getting it."

I couldn't tell Mary about Bernard's son because he'd told me that in confidence, but that didn't mean I couldn't mention his desire to maybe some day have more kids.

"We talked today. About future plans, and he mentioned that…"

I paused because I knew that once I said it, she was going to pump me for more information, and then I'd have to either tell her or end the conversation.

For some reason, I wanted to tell her.

I'd kept it inside for so long that maybe it was time to let it out.

"He mentioned that he might want to have kids one day."

"And you don't?"

"I…can't."

"Oh. But instead of telling him that, you broke up with him," she stated. "Did it occur to you that by him saying he _might one day want them_ he was simply leaving the door open in case it was something _you_ want? I mean, he didn't say, _I can't wait to have them_. He said _might one day_. That's fairly ambiguous. And yet you just dumped him without giving him the opportunity to make his own decision."

"But that's just it. What if he decided that he didn't care about it, but later he changed his mind? Or if he only _said_ he didn't care, but he really does and then he ends up resenting me. Or…"

"Whoa, slow down," she said soothingly. "You're having this whole conversation _for_ him. Why don't you have it _with_ him?"

"Because every man I've dated in the past has dropped me after I came clean."

"Because you can't have kids? Seriously? I mean, I'm not trying to diminish the importance. Honestly, I'm not, and I'm really sorry that you can't, but it surprises me that men would be turned off by that."

"For most of them, it was the reason behind it," I explained vaguely.

I kept my gaze trained on my feet, feeling nauseous just from thinking about it.

"Whatever the reason," she said, kindly letting me off the hook of elaborating. "You already said that Bernard isn't like anyone you've ever been with, right?"

"Not even close."

"Then why pigeon-hole him into reacting like every other man? Why not give him the opportunity to show you how much better he is?"

"But what if he's not? I mean, this is bad."

"But what if he is? Don't you want to find out?"

I sighed heavily and stretched my legs out in front of me on the steps.

She had a point.

I couldn't exactly live my life based on could-have-beens.

And maybe I wasn't being fair to Bernard.

"Take it from someone who's screwed up more relationships than I can count," she continued.

"I'll think about it," I conceded.

"Well, you'd better think quickly," she said, giving me a nudge with her arm.

I looked up and saw that Bernard had just parked across the street and was getting out of his car.

I felt a rush of panic go through me at the sight of him.

_What was he doing here?_

"Inspector Shannon," he said amicably as he approached the steps. He stopped at the bottom and just stood there looking at us.

"Detective Bernard," she replied.

"Are you officially a resident of Brooklyn now?"

"It looks that way," she said as she got to her feet. "And I've still got a lot of unpacking to do, so I'd better get back inside."

She looked pointedly at me and gave me an encouraging nod and then she went inside the building. Bernard paused for another moment and then he climbed the steps and took her vacated spot.

"So, I keep replaying our conversation from earlier," he began. "Trying to figure out where I went wrong. And I'm usually the first to admit when it's me who's messed up, but I've got to tell you, Lauren…I don't think it's me this time."

"It's not," I agreed quickly.

He reached over and put his hand under my chin, tilting my head up until I made eye contact with him.

"You said you need to take a step back."

"That's right," I said, although even I could hear the quavering uncertainty of my voice.

"Uh uh. You don't want to take a step back," he said confidently. "You're just scared to tell me something."

"What makes you so sure about that?" I asked defiantly, ignoring the fact that I was at once dismayed and pleased by the fact that he knew me so well.

"You were fishing for something earlier," he stated. "It was some kind of test, and I failed it."

"It wasn't a test."

"Then you're disappointed in me for having a son that I don't publicly acknowledge. Is that it? It makes you see what kind of man I really am?"

"No," I answered immediately. "No, it's not that at all."

"Then _tell_ me," he insisted. "Because I'm not walking away from you. Unless you tell me that you honestly don't feel the same about me…unless you've truly decided that you don't want me…"

"You know that's not it," I admitted.

Because I certainly couldn't lie to him about that. And the way that he was looking at me made me feel like he could see right through my defenses.

He'd mentioned many times how much he likes my blue eyes, but as far as I was concerned, they had nothing on his dark brown ones.

So I continued to stare at him as his gaze softened and he said quietly, "Then give us a chance."

"You don't know what you're asking, B.," I said on a sigh.

But he put his arm around my shoulders and pulled me to him, and even though we'd only been technically apart for a few hours, I realized that I'd missed him in that short amount of time.

Which was unbelievably crazy, considering that we'd still been working together all afternoon.

But I'd intentionally severed our connection, and despite our close proximity, I still felt like there was a huge gap between us.

And of course, there was. And I'd put it there.

But now, even though this whole thing was my fault, he'd come to me and he was trying to bridge that distance.

"I'm asking you to trust that I'm not going to hold something from your past against you. I mean, that's what it is, right? Something bad from your past? The nightmares, too."

"Yes," I confessed.

And maybe this was going to be easier than I thought.

"Let's go inside," I told him.

"And then you'll tell me?"

"And then I'll tell you everything."

TBC...


	35. Chapter 35

**Alex POV**

* * *

><p>It had been a long day so far.<p>

We'd tracked down Jim Randall in New Jersey and brought him back to New York.

We'd followed Connie's trail, viewing innumerous grainy ATM video clips until Lupo had finally broken the case open.

And before any of us could get there, she'd managed to escape.

Which was great news for Connie.

I knew first hand how much the recovery from such a traumatic experience was accelerated due to being self-reliant.

But it was bad news for us, as cops.

Because Lupo hadn't been too far behind her, and if she hadn't escaped, then he would've caught up to them at her captor's house.

He would've been able to save her and arrest Carl.

Probably.

There was always the possibility that something could've gone wrong, so ultimately, it was best that it had happened the way it did.

Connie was safe and that was the important thing.

And Carl's face and both of his names were out on the wire.

It was just a matter of time now.

After we'd taken over the search of Carl's secondary residence, Carolyn had filled Bobby and me in on the latest with Jack.

_"I'm meeting him tonight_," she said.

"_Alone?_" I'd asked sharply, letting her know that if the answer was _yes_, she was clearly out of her mind.

"_Not alone_," she answered. _"Mike's going to set up surveillance."_

_"We'll be there_," Bobby said firmly, taking the words right out of my mouth.

Which was why I wasn't presently snuggled with Bobby in our bed, even though it was nine-thirty at night.

And I know, that's a little early, but I was _tired_.

We'd gone back to 1PP after finishing up at Carl's house, and we'd gone three rounds with Jim Randall.

Bobby had walked into the interrogation room, in that commanding way of his that inexplicably and inevitably gets me hot and bothered, and then he'd tossed autopsy photos of Vanessa and Eva onto the table.

Randall's interest was unmistakable.

_"Looks like you had trouble making up your mind_," Bobby stated. _"Is that because you lack conviction?"_

Randall remained quiet, so Bobby paced for a moment in front of the table and then stopped directly across from our suspect, who continued to look at the pictures. I stayed near the door, and let Bobby do his thing.

It was his turn, after all.

So I just watched him as he leaned down in an effort to capture Randall's attention.

"_You beat her…both of them. But what…you weren't strong enough to finish them off with your bare hands? So then you got out a knife."_

He paused dramatically as he spread the photos out across the table.

"_And you stabbed each of them…repeatedly. But apparently you're an incompetent killer because even that wasn't enough, was it? So then you got out your gun. The one that's being tested as we speak by our ballistics department. The one you used to shoot at me earlier today in New Jersey. They'll be matching up the slugs that were found in Vanessa and Eva to _this_ gun_," he said loudly, pulling out a picture of the nine millimeter handgun that we'd confiscated from Randall. "_You shot them both in a last ditch effort to finally stop their nagging existence. Isn't that right, Randall?"_

_"You don't know what you're talking about."_

_"Sure I do."_

_"Detective, are you going somewhere with this line of questioning?"_ Randall's lawyer spoke up.

"_I just want him to admit what he did_," Bobby said simply. And then he started pacing again, finally coming to a stop on the opposite side of the room. He looked at me and flashed me a smile. "_Do you want to tell him, Detective_?"

_"No, go ahead,"_ I deflected, enjoying watching him in such a playful mood. He knew that the next words out of his mouth were probably going to have Randall inadvertantly shouting out his confession.

_"Okay, well, Jimmy…here's the thing,"_ he said as he folded his arms across his chest. _"Everything you did to Vanessa…the beating, choking, stabbing…even shooting her with your gun…it didn't kill her."_

_"What? But…but…"_ Randall sputtered in confusion as he once again looked at the autopsy photos.

"_I know,"_ Bobby said with a nod. _"It kind of blows your mind, doesn't it?"_

_"Detective, what kind of game is this? Is Ms. Sullivan dead or not?"_

_"Oh, she's dead,_" I confirmed.

"_But not from anything I did to her_," Randall stated. "_That's what he just said, right?"_

_"That depends,"_ Bobby said quietly, having walked around the table while Randall was focused on me so that now he was standing right behind him. "_Did you slip a little antifreeze into her morning coffee? Did you think that would make it easier on you?"_

_"Antifreeze?"_

_"She had antifreeze in her system!"_ Bobby said loudly. "_You gave it to her to make her compliant, right?"_

_"No!"_

_"Or maybe you just thought it would shut her up. Because that's what you wanted to do, right? She nagged you until you couldn't take it anymore. You slipped her some antifreeze, but it takes longer to react in some people. Maybe you got frustrated that she didn't ease up on you. Or maybe she got even more bitchy because she felt sick."_

_"She did! You have no idea!"_

Randall's lawyer chucked him to get him to shut up, but Randall shrugged him off.

"_Sure I do_," Bobby said encouragingly. "_I mean, I know women. They want everything done their way, on their schedule…it's a miracle that more guys don't end up killing their girlfriends, right? I mean, what are they good for, other than the obvious?"_

_"Exactly,"_ Randall agreed, sitting back in his chair.

"_So you gave her the antifreeze because you thought it would mellow her out. You thought it would make her sick and helpless and then you could be the hero by taking care of her."_

_"Or you gave it to her so that she wouldn't fight back the way that Eva did_," I posed. "_What's the matter, Jimmy? Were you afraid of your hundred and ten pound girlfriend?"_

Randall glared at me and then looked to Bobby for help.

"_I just thought it would make her sick_," he admitted.

"_The antifreeze_."

"_Yeah. She was going to leave me and I didn't want her to go. I loved her."_

_"Then help me out here, Jimmy. If your plan was to make her a little more dependent on you, to make her not want to leave, then why'd you beat her up? The ME says she was strangled to the point where the blood vessels in her eyes ruptured."_

Not to mention the fact that he'd stabbed and shot her, too.

"_She got pissed at me_," he admitted. "_She accused me of poisoning her, and she tried to insist on going to the hospital, but I couldn't let her go because I knew they'd figure it out."_

_"So you had to kill her to cover up the fact that you poisoned her."_

And that was the bottom line.

He'd used the antifreeze as a means to make her into what he wanted, not so that she wouldn't fight back.

Maybe we weren't always right with the _why_, but we still usually got our man, and this time was no different.

We sent Randall off to lock-up after making arrangements for his lawyer to meet with an ADA in the morning. Normally, one would've come over right away, but the DA's office was still in a bit of turmoil, so we didn't push the issue.

But it was still a productive day, and like I said. It wasn't over yet.

It was presently nine-thirty, and we were positioned in a pedestrian walkway that went over top of 23rd Street and had a perfect view of the Court Square Diner.

Carolyn had just gone inside, but Jack had yet to arrive.

While we waited, I checked in with Lupo by text.

_**Back home yet?**_

He replied within about a minute.

_**Just pulling up now. Twenty-three stitches in all. Any word on Carl?**_

I hated to tell him that we had nothing, but that's where we were at the moment.

The phone that Mulder had so craftily tracked had been found smashed in Carl's driveway. Apparently it had fallen out of his pocket at some point while Connie was kicking his ass, and then he'd driven over it on his way out.

Running the alias of David Camden had only netted us what we already knew. The address of the house in Queens and the old Chevy that he was driving around in.

My bet would be that he'd ditched the car by now and had probably paid cash for a hotel room where he was licking his wounds.

According to Hayes' recount of Connie's statement, Carl had to be in bad shape, so we'd gotten the word out to local hospitals, too. We'd issued a BOLO complete with a full-color photo.

If he sought medical treatment, then hopefully we'd hear about it.

But Lupo didn't need to hear all of the details now.

_**Nothing yet. I'll keep you in the loop.**_

I tucked my phone into my pocket and then glanced at Bobby.

"Now what was it you were saying earlier about how all women nag?"

"Trade-related rhetoric," he answered quickly.

"And women are only good for…remind me again?" I asked him with a fake smile on my face.

"You said that?" Mike questioned.

"I was getting the guy to confess," he explained to Mike.

"Did it work?"

"Perfectly."

Mike looked at me and grinned and said, "Then quit nagging him."

I rolled my eyes and let out a loud, long-suffering sigh, but on the inside, I was happy.

We'd closed yet another case.

So had Mike and Carolyn.

And now we were going to see what the slime ball Jack was up to.

"There's the prick now," Mike muttered, pointing down to the street below where Jack was getting out of a cab. Then he turned on his mike and added, "He's headed your way, sweetheart."

"I can't wait to hear this," Bobby said quietly to me. "What can he possibly think he's going to get from her?"

"Payback. As far as he's concerned, she betrayed him by uncovering his crimes."

We stopped talking as we watched Jack enter the diner. He scanned the room and then made his way to the booth where Carolyn was sitting.

_**"Ten minutes early is five minutes late,"**_ she told him. He smiled broadly at her and sat down.

_**"Old habits die hard, don't they? Any other old habits you want to pick back up?"**_

_**"Can't think of a one," **_she said firmly.

I liked that she looked calm and confident. I knew she had to be boiling on the inside.

And Mike…he was clenching his hand into a fist so tightly that I worried about his circulation.

_**"So…seen any good pictures lately?"**_ Jack asked her.

_**"Nothing that caught my interest. Now cut the bullshit and tell me what you want."**_

_**"Did you pull Mike's mother's file?"**_

_**"You know I did."**_

_**"What did you think?"**_

_**"It's all old news. There's nothing in there I haven't already heard."**_

I noticed that Mike cast me and Bobby a worried glance, so I reached out and settled my hand on his back in a subtle show of support.

_**"Really? Are you sure about that?"**_

_**"Yeah. And now I'm bored, too. What else have you got?"**_

_**"What about Cher? Have you looked at that file?"**_

This one would take a little more finesse because the lab results still hadn't been examined. Liz would be back tomorrow to go over that information, but really…what could it possibly contain?

_**"Of course."**_

_**"And?"**_

_**"You know what, Jack? It's been a long day, and I'm tired. Let's do this another time. I'm going home."**_

She got up from the table, but he stopped her with a hand on her wrist.

And then Bobby had to stop Mike by grabbing onto his arm.

_**"Sit back down,"**_ Jack said firmly.

Carolyn glared at him for a moment and then reluctantly sat down.

_**"Here's the deal,"**_ he began. _**"You have a bank account that I need access to."**_

_**"I'm not giving you any money. If you want to mail the pictures, mail them."**_

_**"It's not your money. It's mine."**_

_**"In my account?"**_

_**"In an account that I opened for you. It's in the Caymans."**_

_**"How much is in it?"**_

_**"Fourteen million dollars."**_

_**"That's a nice wedding present. Thank you."**_

"So that's it," Bobby mumbled. "He opened it in her name, thinking that it would keep him off the radar of whoever might be looking at him, but now he can't get it out and the feds have seized all of his other assets."

"He thinks she's just going to hand it over? He really doesn't know her."

"I'm sure he's got an ace in the hole somewhere," Mike stated. "We just need to figure out what it is."

_**"I'm not giving you any money,"**_ Jack bit out, and it seemed as though now that he was down to the real reason for his need of Carolyn that he'd lost a lot of his arrogance. _**"I just need you to get it out and put it into an account that I can use. I've got a false identity in the works. When the time comes, I'll let you know what name to use."**_

_**"You know there's no way I'm going to do it. Like I said, send the pictures. Hell, post them on the internet. I don't care. Tomorrow morning I'll just call your probation officer and let him know that you've got more money socked away…"**_

_**"The pictures are nothing compared to what I'll do to you,"**_ he growled out, leaning across the table towards her. _**"I just wanted to mess with your mind a little bit. Did it work? Did seeing us together like that make you compare Mike to me? I wonder how Mike would feel if he hears how he came out on the short end of that stick."**_

_**"If I were you, I wouldn't want to use the words **_**short **_**and **_**stick**_** in the same sentence. Not with those pictures floating around."**_

I couldn't keep from barking out a laugh at her insult, and I noticed that her smirk followed my laugh instead of just her comment.

_**"You've lost a step, Carolyn,"**_ Jack chastised, although his face was red from her slight. _**"You're attacking me instead of looking at the problem."**_

_**"You **_**are**_** the problem,"**_ she countered.

_**"It's going to be you who has the problem. You're thinking about turning in that money, but maybe you should ask yourself where it came from."**_

"That was my next question," Bobby said. "If it went into an account in Carolyn's name, then maybe he's been setting her up for something bigger than we anticipated."

"Like what? Embezzlement?"

"Probably. Or from his counterfeiting scheme. It's hard to say, and without more information it's going to be difficult to trace. That's his ace. Wherever it came from, unless she gets it out and hands it over, he can drop a dime on her at any time."

Mike looked agitatedly at us and nodded his head.

"And all of the evidence will point to her."

TBC...


	36. Chapter 36

**Bobby POV**

* * *

><p>I couldn't stop thinking about Jack Quarles.<p>

How long had he been planning to screw Carolyn over?

Or had he just wanted to use her identity to hide his illegal activities, and now in an oddly coincidental manner it had worked out to his advantage?

I didn't normally believe in coincidence, but I also found it implausible that he'd plotted to set her up even _before_ she'd taken him down in Asheville.

What would be the point?

According to Carolyn, they'd communicated sporadically over the years, but there was nothing to indicate an increased level of obsession on Jack's part.

Was it solely due to the fact that she'd chosen justice over him?

Or was it that now she'd found someone who made her happy, as opposed to all those years of bouncing from one relationship to the next?

Maybe he'd maintained the fantasy that they'd eventually get back together, based upon the idea that she'd been unable to settle down with anyone else.

Maybe he'd taken that as a sign that she still loved him.

And maybe that was why he'd put the money into an account in her name…because in his mind, one day they'd be together.

It was a whole lot of maybes and it was making my head hurt.

"Turn it off."

"But…" I began as I turned to face my wife.

Words left me when I saw her.

She was standing several feet away from me, dressed in a black silk nightgown that stopped mid-thigh. The material looked soft and delicate, weightless and impossibly smooth.

It instantly begged for my touch, as did the expanse of skin left exposed by the brief garment.

Her hair was loose and still damp from the shower and as much as I wanted to touch her, I almost wanted to look at her more.

She was so beautiful…so _mine_.

"You were supposed to join me," she reminded me without rebuke.

She'd made the suggestion nearly half an hour ago, but I was still rooted to the same spot in front of the living room window, still fully dressed in my suit and tie.

"I know…I…"

"Can't stop thinking about Jack," she finished.

"I can't," I admitted as I took a step closer to her, inhaling deeply as I detected the scent of her soap and shampoo in the air.

"I can probably help you with that." she asserted lightly.

She uncapped the bottle of lotion that she held in her hands, and now that enticing aroma mixed with the others, creating the blend that was just simply Alex.

I continued to move toward her as she stood still at the edge of the living room.

She squeezed some lotion into the palm of her hand and slowly began rubbing it on her skin, first along one arm and then the other.

I was mesmerized by her actions, and I suddenly felt huge and clumsy and dirty compared to the pristine vision in front of me.

"Maybe I should shower first," I said reluctantly, coming to a halt directly in front of her.

She smelled even better up close…looked even more beautiful.

The urge to touch her skin was now almost overwhelming, but I continued to use my eyes instead of my hands, letting my gaze wander freely over her body.

"You don't have to," she countered. Then she reached out and ran her hand along the lapel of my jacket and said, "Maybe I like you a little dirty."

Then she turned and headed for the bedroom, pausing mid-way down the hall to cast a questioning glance over her shoulder.

"Coming?"

This whole scenario was playing out like an x-rated fantasy from my days of ole and yet she seemed oblivious to the fact that I was fully ensconced in desire.

And maybe it was because she didn't seem to realize just exactly how beautiful she is that made her even more so.

But she certainly didn't need to extend the offer twice.

I swiftly followed her down the hall and into the bedroom where she sat down on the chair next to the bed and began applying the lotion to her legs.

Again, I was entranced as her fingers worked over her skin.

"Bobby?"

"Yeah?" I asked, still watching her progress.

"Get undressed," she said with amusement. "So that I can take your mind off Jack."

"I'm sorry…who?" I asked with a grin as I plucked the bottle of lotion from her hand and knelt down next to her.

I smelled the open bottle experimentally before pouring some into my hand and then I set the bottle on the nightstand.

"It doesn't smell nearly as good as you," I told her as I picked up her foot and began massaging it with the lotion. "How does that work?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean it's designed to make a woman smell nice, right? So how can it be that you already smell better than the product specifically designed to improve upon your scent? They should just make lotion that smells like you. That would be a top seller."

She laughed lightly at my musings, but kept her head back against the chair and her eyes closed.

"I could say the same thing about you," she offered.

"Not at the moment, you couldn't," I argued.

I finished with one foot, so I brought it to my lips and kissed the sole before setting it down and starting to work on the other.

"It's not you that smells bad. It's your clothes," she said. She opened her eyes and looked at me as she added, "So maybe you need to take them off."

"I'm not done yet," I told her as I moved my hands up her legs.

I rose up on my knees and eased closer to her, pushing her legs apart as I moved between them.

"I didn't say you had to be done," she countered. She ran her hand along my jaw and then leaned in to kiss me. "I just said that I want you naked."

She brought her lips to mine as she held my face with both hands and for a split second I wanted to ask her about her sling, but even I was able to realize that this wasn't exactly the time for such a question, and as long as we didn't get too carried away, then surely her shoulder would be fine.

And as I had that thought, she moved her hands from my face to my shoulders, encouraging me to lay back on the floor.

Of course, I complied, and she was immediately on top of me, and my hands were under her nightgown, feeling the full extent of all of that wonderfully smooth skin.

She worked quickly to undress me and all the while she kept kissing me, everywhere, not just on my lips, and I needed to slow down or it was all going to be over much too fast.

"See? It was the clothes," she stated with a smile as she rid me of the last stitch of clothing and once again settled on top of me.

I still had my doubts about that, but I certainly wasn't going to argue with her, especially since she was rocking against me in a delightfully tortuous rhythm that had me biting the inside of my cheek in an effort to maintain some semblance of control.

As much as I loved looking at her in the black silk, I suddenly desperately needed to see her _out_ of the black silk, so I grabbed the hem of the nightgown and began pulling it upwards, but at the last second, I thought about her shoulder, and I didn't want her to have to raise her arms over her head, so I dropped the fabric and instead slid the straps from her shoulders so that it pooled at her waist.

"You're still thinking," she chastised, having picked up on my deliberate change of plans.

"Only about you," I replied. "Doesn't that count for something?"

She smiled and then leaned over me, using her right hand to support her weight as she began to kiss her way from my neck up to my ear and then along my cheek.

"Don't think," she whispered. "Just feel."

She's very persuasive, my Alex.

And for the next however long, I didn't think about a thing.

In fact, I was still in a blissful haze nearly two hours later when the phone rang, shattering the peaceful silence.

By this point, we were in the bed, under the covers. Neither of us was asleep just yet, but instead we were in that relaxing place that often occurs just before drifting off.

Or at least, it often occurs _now_.

Before Alex, my sleep habits were erratic at best. I routinely used liquor as a sleep aid which conversely left me restless and exhausted the next day.

But that was then.

It never ceased to amaze me, the number of ways that Alex made my life better.

"We're not answering that," she mumbled. She'd initially startled at the sound, but then she'd relaxed again without moving from her position against my chest.

"It could be Ross."

"He'd call our cells."

She had a point about that. And we weren't on the call-out list, even though we'd cleared our case this afternoon.

But with so much going on in our friends' lives, it made me worry when the phone rang this late at night.

"Or Lupo," I suggested.

"Same argument. No one calls the home phone."

"Sean?" I continued, unable to let it go.

The phone was still ringing, and the longer it went on, the more awake I became.

She let out a heavy sigh and said, "I _did_ tell him to call me back, but I didn't mean at midnight. Let the machine get it."

After one more ring, the machine picked up.

I heard Alex's voice give the no-nonsense instructions of _leave your name and number and we'll call you back_, and then Sean's voice came through loud and clear.

"_Hey, guys, it's Sean. Sorry it's so late, but I figured you guys would still be up, and since the news has started spreading, I didn't want you to hear it from someone else…"_

"Figured we'd be up?" Alex said, but she only sounded slightly irritated. She had a soft spot for Sean, who by all accounts had been her partner in crime growing up.

"_Anyway, so Alicia's pregnant. I know. I can't believe it either. But we went for the ultrasound yesterday afternoon, and…it's twins. Crazy, right? I guess it won't be too long before I catch up to Kevin after all, huh? So…sorry to tell you on the machine, but we ran into Cathy and then she told Steve and Mom and, well, you know how that goes. Anyway, I'll see you guys tomorrow."_

We were both silent for a moment as the news registered and then she sat up in the bed.

"I'm sorry. I have to call him back," she told me apologetically as a smile crossed her face. "I just can't believe it."

I scooted up in the bed so that I could lean against the headboard. She reached over and picked up the phone and then leaned back next to me as she dialed her brother's number.

It took twenty minutes for the two of us to get the whole rundown from Sean, complete with a rendition of what the babies' heartbeats sounded like.

"He's so excited," she said contentedly when we were once again laying under the covers, in the dark. "I didn't even know they wanted more kids."

I couldn't even begin to imagine the chaos involved with having four children, although I guess Johnny and Mary had survived it.

"They're going to need a bigger house," I mused.

"Uh huh," she hummed. "Poor Lauren."

"Hayes? Why?"

"He's going to be showing her every picture and talking about every hiccup for the next eighteen years. Times two."

"I'm sure she'll be a good sport about it. Hey, did you notice something off with her and Bernard today?"

"Yeah," she agreed. "I can't decide if they were just worried about Connie or if it was personal between the two of them."

"I'm going with personal," I asserted.

"What makes you say that?"

"Because she wouldn't look at him. When you and I are upset about something, we lean on each other. She was pushing him away."

"They'll get through it," she said confidently. "She's just getting up the nerve to talk to him about something."

"I hope so," I replied.

She shifted against me, lifting her head so that she could look me in the eye.

"Are you getting sentimental in your old age?" she teased.

"Why, because I hope that they can be happy together?"

"Yeah," she answered, running her hand over my heavily stubbled cheek. "And because you noticed the subtle rift between them."

"I like Bernard. He's a friend. And if Lauren can make him even half as happy as you make me, then I want that for him. Does that make me sentimental?"

"I don't know," she said, and then she pressed her lips to mine, kissing me softly for a long minute. She pulled back and smiled at me and said, "But I know what it does make you."

"What's that?" I asked as she moved again, this time so that she could settle her head back against my chest.

"One hell of a good man."

TBC...


	37. Chapter 37

**Logan POV**

* * *

><p>"What are you working on?"<p>

I'd just spent the past twenty minutes on the phone with my brother and when I went in search of Carolyn, I found her sitting at the kitchen table, working feverishly on her laptop.

"Carl," she answered vaguely.

She probably figured that researching Carl might be something she could be successful at as opposed to trying to figure out the details of what Jack had up his sleeve.

But catching one crook was as good as another, so I wasn't going to knock it.

She glanced up at me and asked, "What did John have to say?"

"He's going to be in town for awhile. I told him that maybe we could get together tomorrow night. I know Alex and Bobby wanted to do something, just the four of us, but she only suggested that because she's worried that I'm upset about them reading that file."

We were actually supposed to have gotten together tonight, but our little covert operation on Jack had caused us to postpone.

"And you're not?" she questioned. I walked around the table and stood behind her chair, settling my hands on her shoulders.

"I'm fine with it. Like you said, it won't change what they think of me."

She tilted her head back so that she could look up at me and then reached backwards to wrap her arms around my waist.

"You've grown in leaps and bounds today, Mike. Are you sure you're not just glossing it over?"

"I was overdue for a little maturity," I said with a shrug. Then I nodded in the direction of her chest and smiled at her as I said, "Although I'm not too mature to look down your blouse."

She laughed and sat back up in the chair.

"You're still in a good mood," she said in disbelief. "Even with everything going on."

I walked around beside her chair and motioned for her to stand up. She raised her eyebrow at me, but got up from her chair, so then I sat down and pulled her onto my lap.

"I've decided to take a different approach," I told her as I pushed a piece of hair back behind her ear.

"And what's that?" she asked teasingly. "Complete denial?"

"I'm going to be grateful for what I have. I worry so much about what might go wrong in the future that I think maybe I'm not taking the time to enjoy the present."

"So that's your new motto? Live in the now?"

"I think it's a good one," I answered. And then I reached up and began unbuttoning her blouse. "And right now, I'm curious as to what you have on under here."

"You just looked a minute ago," she replied coyly.

"Okay, so maybe I'm interested in taking a closer inspection."

I finished with the buttons and so I pushed the fabric apart and down her arms, letting it fall onto the floor.

"Do I pass?" she asked me as I looked at her appreciatively.

"Always. I remember the first time you asked me that."

"When was that?"

"When you tracked me down at Lou's. I followed you to a booth, and you caught me checking out your ass."

She smiled fully and put her hand on my cheek.

"I didn't catch you," she countered. "I just hoped that you were, so I figured I'd throw out the question and gauge your response."

"Well, you definitely busted me. But can you blame me? I mean, have you seen your ass?"

I ran my hands over her bare back and then down to the current topic of our discussion.

But I didn't have enough room to maneuver in the chair, so I grabbed on tight and stood up, taking her with me into the living room. I set her down on the couch and then unfastened her slacks and pulled them off of her.

"I was working," she argued lightly.

"We'll work together," I offered as I stepped out of my shoes and then pulled my shirt over my head. "Later. Right now, my brain is on other things."

"I don't think your brain factors into your intentions at all," she teased. "Unless your brain is in your…"

She trailed off her sentence and instead reached out and unzipped my pants.

"Is that what you think of me?" I asked, closing my eyes as she slid one hand inside for a moment before grabbing onto my jeans with both hands and tugging them downward.

"You know what I think of you," she said in a sultry voice as she stood up and wrapped her arms around me.

My plan had been to take my time, to draw things out, but I was instantly swamped with need when she molded her body against mine, so that plan went out the window.

Instead, I picked her up and turned us around so that her back was to the wall and then I pushed into her with unceremonious vigor.

We were against the staircase wall, so she reached over her head and grabbed onto the bannister spindles, which changed the angle and gave her better leverage.

I've got to say that I love her ingenuity.

I put my hands over hers where they gripped the spindles and then settled into an intense rhythm.

Somewhere along the line, the image of her and Jack popped into my brain.

I probably should've expected that to happen, since this was our first time together since I looked at the picture, but with everything else that had happened since, I'd almost forgotten about it.

It's importance had lessened considerably.

And even more so now, because even though the image crossed my mind, I was able to dismiss it.

Mostly.

Maybe I did push into her a little harder.

And maybe I left an extra mark or two on her neck.

But the fact was that Jack was yesterday's news.

And nothing she'd ever had with him could come close to comparing to what the two of us had together.

I'm happy to say that I didn't waste more than a minute or two of time thinking about that.

And then I refocused all of my energy on making Carolyn's face flush and her eyes go unfocused.

It didn't take long.

"I lost you somewhere in the middle," she said after we'd peeled our fingers from the bannister and together we'd flopped onto the couch.

"But did I make up for it at the end?" I asked, trying to play it off.

"We're okay?" she questioned seriously, keeping her arms wrapped tightly around me.

This was probably what she'd feared. That after seeing her with Jack, it would make me look at her differently, and she'd obviously picked up on the fact that my mind had briefly wandered while we were making love.

"We're perfect," I assured her.

"But you thought about him for a minute. Didn't you?"

"Sweetheart, as long as _you_ didn't think about him…"

"Mike."

"I did," I admitted. "But just for a minute. And he just seems so…insignificant."

"Well, he is," she agreed.

She relaxed her hold on me and settled more comfortably against me now that I'd apparently eased her mind.

I almost wanted to point out that we should've gone through this last Friday when he first called, but I wasn't going to give her hell about that.

She'd come clean soon enough.

And who knows how I might have responded if the situation was reversed?

"Hey, you know what John called the two of us?"

"Um…no," she said cautiously.

"He said we have the textbook marriage. He said that if someone looked up the word _marriage_ in the dictionary, our picture would be next to it."

"You think he's right?"

"Well, it would either be us or Bobby and Alex," I said with a smile.

"Wait, what made him start talking about marriage?"

"I don't know."

"You don't think…I mean, they've only known each other for a few months."

"Well, she did move halfway across the country for him."

"Not for him," she corrected. "For work."

"Uh huh. I'm sure there weren't any openings in California," I said skeptically. "So what were you looking up about Carl?"

"I just wanted to see if I could find some hint as to where he might hide. We do have some experience trying to track people who use multiple identities."

"Did you find anything?"

"Maybe," she said, and then she smiled at me and added, "But then I got distracted."

"Well, let's go take a look at it and see what we can come up with."

* * *

><p><strong>Liz POV<strong>

We trolled the campus for hours, but never spotted Jeremy.

"Maybe it's someone he knows from off-campus," I suggested.

"Why didn't he just tell us?" Danny said, shaking his head in frustration.

"Because he wants to handle it on his own."

"He wants to confront a killer?" he fired back at me. "He's supposed to be a smart kid, and yet he's out here somewhere trying to play John Wayne."

"Maybe he's trying to play Danny Ross," I countered.

My remark caused him to stop and stare at me for a moment and then he let out a heavy sigh and sat down on a bench near the tennis courts on the south side of campus.

I sat down next to him and took hold of his hand.

"We're not going to find him until he wants to be found, are we?" he asked tiredly.

"No."

By this point, it was nearly eleven o'clock at night.

We'd gotten the call hours ago to let us know that Connie was safe, even though her stalker was still on the loose.

And a little later, Alex had sent a text to let us know that they'd closed their case.

So did Mike and Carolyn.

It was a relief to know that, at least for tonight, things in New York were quiet.

Because Baltimore certainly wasn't.

I didn't want Danny to see how worried I was about Jeremy, but on the inside, I was really afraid for the boy.

And I know. He's not a boy anymore.

But still…how would the killer react to being confronted?

Most likely, not well at all.

And what did he hope to gain from the confrontation?

Was he looking for an explanation? Or an apology?

Or maybe he was thinking like his father and he hoped to get a confession.

At this point, I had no idea what he'd try to do.

Most likely a little bit of all three.

But would he also try to get payback?

I'd never seen Jeremy get physical with anyone, but if he knew that this person he was after had killed the woman he loved, it was hard to say how he'd respond.

I mean, I had no doubt whatsoever that Danny would've wanted to kill Pebo if I hadn't taken care of him myself.

I tried to force the excessive worry from my mind. It was more important that I be supportive for Danny than to harbor my own doubts.

We sat quietly for several minutes and then I felt Danny's phone buzz. He quickly pulled it out.

"It's Jeremy," he said excitedly as he pushed the button to answer the call. "Where are you?"

I watched his face expectantly and was relieved to see that he relaxed after hearing whatever Jeremy had to say.

"So are we. We're next to the tennis courts. We'll wait for you."

He hung up and put his phone away before hugging me to him.

"He's headed this way."

"What happened?"

"I'm not sure. He just said that things didn't work out like he planned. Tomorrow, we'll all go to the precinct and he can make a statement pertaining to what he remembers."

"Good. So he didn't say who?"

"One of the kids that Alex and Bobby put on the top of their suspect list," he answered with a nod.

Big surprise there.

As far as I was concerned, judges should issue arrest warrants based on the Gorens' hunches.

"Kenny Cossman," Danny continued.

"The boy that had a crush on Kelly?"

"Yeah. I know. It doesn't make much sense, does it? I'm anxious to hear what he has to say."

Ten minutes later, Jeremy walked out of the shadows and approached us where we sat on the bench.

He looked sheepish and tired and…I don't know. Something else.

Danny immediately got up and hugged him.

I stayed on the bench and let them have their moment, but then I heard Danny's phone buzzing again, so I got up and pulled it from his pocket.

"I'll take care of it," I told him, and then I answered the call. "Chief Ross' phone."

"This is Detective Rainey with the Baltimore Police Department. Is the chief available?"

Now, normally I would've said yes.

But not right now.

Not when Danny and Jeremy were engaged in conversation.

They _needed_ this.

And it was Baltimore PD, not New York, so the call wasn't professional.

"No, he isn't. This is his wife. Can I take a message?"

"Maybe you can help me, Mrs. Ross. I'm trying to pin down the whereabouts of Jeremy Ross over the course of the last six hours."

"For the purpose of what?" I asked.

My radar was up and I began to study Jeremy's face.

Had he done something?

Had he found Kenny?

"You're aware that he's a suspect in an ongoing investigation," the detective stated.

"Of course," I replied sharply, and now my protectiveness was up, in addition to my radar.

My tone caused Danny and Jeremy to pause in their conversation and they both looked at me questioningly, but I continued to listen to the detective.

"And it's my understanding that Jeremy was in Baltimore today."

"That's right. To attend the funeral of his girlfriend."

"And is he currently back in New York?"

"No, he's still in Baltimore. All three of us are. Now tell me what this is about."

"Have you been with your son all evening?"

I didn't bother to correct his misconception that Jeremy was mine.

Considering the way Nancy treated him, I wished he _was_ my son, but that was irrelevant at this point.

"Detective, this is harassment. There are no formal charges against…"

"Kenny Cossman was found dead about an hour ago," he interrupted.

"What?" I shouted in surprise.

"Yes, ma'am," he stated firmly. "His body was discovered in Druid Hill Park. I'm sure you're aware that he was also a person of interest in the investigation."

"So you think Jeremy did it?"

"I'm asking you if you know where your son was this evening. It's a simple yes or no question."

I stared hard at Jeremy, taking in his innocent blue eyes and his open, honest face.

And then I did something that I absolutely never do.

"Then my answer is yes, Detective. Jeremy hasn't left my sight since we arrived in Baltimore."

TBC...


	38. Chapter 38

**Bernard POV**

* * *

><p>It was seven-thirty when I got to 1PP.<p>

I didn't get any sleep at all last night.

I wish I could say it was because Lauren and I got back together and spent the entire night engaging in gratifying make-up sex, but that's not the case.

"_I'll tell you everything,"_ she'd promised me as we stood on her front steps.

I thought that meant she was willing to reconsider her stand on our relationship.

But I was wrong.

We went inside, and she made good on her promise.

I found out that ten years ago, she'd been raped.

It took nearly an hour for her to actually begin to get the words out.

She sat in the chair instead of on the couch, like she wanted to give me the clear signal that she didn't want me to try to comfort her or reach out to her or anything.

So I'd sat stock still on the sofa and listened to her relive the worst night of her life.

She cried as she described what had happened. Big, silent tears that rolled unchecked down her cheeks. I made a move to give her my handkerchief, but she startled, almost as though she'd forgotten that I was even in the room, so I resumed my static position.

And while I watched her rehash the experience, I realized a few things.

First off, she'd obviously never gotten any kind of help. In fact, I'd bet my badge that I was the first person she'd told, after the initial incident.

Secondly, I should've seen the signs. And maybe that was a little over the top as far as expectations went, but she definitely had a stronger than normal need to be in control in the bedroom. And there was the fact that she liked to talk during sex, almost like she had the need to remain connected to the present, for fear of letting her mind wander back to the past.

And okay, so it probably was a stretch to think I should've guessed it. Maybe it's just that now I feel guilty thinking about how I gave her a hard time about wanting the conversation…and I teased her about wanting the control.

I should've been more sensitive.

The third thing that hit me was a nearly overwhelming murderous rage over what this unknown man had done to her.

There was no doubt in my mind that if I were to see him on the street, I'd pull out my gun and shoot him dead without a moment's hesitation.

He'd _hurt_ her…emotionally and physically. She didn't get overly detailed in her description of the act itself, but he'd damaged her permanently, leaving her unable to have children.

"_So you can see why we can't be together,"_ she'd concluded.

"_No, I can't,"_ I replied.

"_B., you want kids. I can't have them."_

"_You're putting words in my mouth,"_ I argued lightly. _"When you asked me that…"_

"_When I asked you, it was to find out how you really felt before you learned how damaged I am,"_ she said sharply. _"Anything you say now is just patronizing."_

"_Patronizing? Lauren, you're not giving me a chance to explain."_

"_You're right. I'm not. I told you about what happened because…well, because I guess I needed to. This thing with Carolyn really made me start thinking about it, and once I started, I couldn't stop. I usually wait a little longer in a relationship, but I guess it doesn't matter because it always ends the same. That's why I'm trying to make it easy on you, okay?" _

"_By assuming I can't handle it?"_

She'd sighed heavily and swiped at the moisture on her cheeks.

"_It's not an assumption. You'll _want_ to handle it. But in your mind, you'll think about it. About what he did, and how I let it happen, and…"_

"_You didn't _let_ anything happen," _I said, doing my best to control my anger. _"You were attacked. He held you at gunpoint. What do you think you could've done differently?"_

"_Something!"_ she yelled. "_I'm a cop, for God's sake!"_

"_That doesn't make us immune."_

"_I should've fought harder."_

"_Lauren…"_

"_I'm sorry. You need to go."_

I'd remained still, watching her as she stared at the wall.

I didn't want to go, but I also needed to respect her wishes, so I slowly got up from the couch. My need to touch her, to offer her comfort, was overpowering.

"_Did they catch him?"_ I asked her quietly, because I absolutely had to know.

"_No."_

"_But you filed a report, right?"_

She sighed again and finally brought her eyes to mine. They were huge and luminous and her tears had made the color appear turquoise…and they were begging me to just leave it alone.

"_Yes,"_ she said at last. _"Now please…just…"_

"_I'm going,"_ I said. _"But only because you want me to. If it were up to me, I'd never leave."_

Because that's when the fourth thing hit me.

I was in love with her.

That had to be it. I could feel her pain like it was my own, more so even.

But I left her place without another word, and then I went home and did what any man in my shoes would do.

I had a drink.

And then I had another.

And then I turned on my computer and logged into the NYPD database.

I spent the whole night looking over the scant documentation from ten years ago when Lauren had reported the rape, and then scouring the database for any similar attack committed in the five boroughs.

Because rapists rarely attacked only once, and it was burning my ass that this guy hadn't been caught.

How was that possible?

They had his DNA.

Although ten years ago, the labs weren't quite as efficient and the testing wasn't nearly as advanced. But if they still had the rape kit in evidence lock-up…

Which was why I decided that this morning I was going to place a call to Manhattan SVU.

I had the brief concern that Lauren would be mad at me for stirring the pot, but at the same time, it was still an open case.

The potential was there for any detective, at any time, to initiate a renewed investigation.

And I felt so damn impotent that I had to do _some_thing.

"Benson."

"Olivia, it's Bernard in Major Case."

"What are you doing up and about so early? I thought Major Case detectives got the cushy hours," she teased.

She and I had run into each other a few times over the years. I didn't know her well, but I did know that she was good at her job, and she didn't mind flying under the radar from time to time.

I'd also helped her out of a jam back when I worked for IAB.

"I don't know where you got that idea," I replied. "I've never worked so much in my life."

"Is everything okay? Or are you ready to cash in that chip?"

"I think I'm ready," I agreed, appreciating her straight-to-business attitude. "This is on the DL."

"Of course."

"I need you to pull the evidence from an old rape case. Technically, it's still open, and I'm hoping that maybe with the advancements in testing, if the kit is reprocessed then maybe something will pop."

"Sure," she agreed quickly.

"There's more."

"I had a feeling."

"If you get a hit, I want to know about it first, and then I'll let you know whether or not to proceed with anything."

I gave her the case file number, instead of Lauren's name. Obviously, she'd see the name, but by me not using it, she'd catch on to the fact that we were working in evidence only.

Olivia said that she'd get back with me as soon as she knew something.

When I hung up, I started to feel sick, like maybe I'd just made a huge mistake.

How was Lauren going to react?

I'd have to tell her.

That is, if she was talking to me.

And I had to find some way to convince her that none of what had happened to her mattered to me.

I just wanted to be with her.

"Where's your partner?"

I looked up to see Mike and Carolyn walking into the squad room.

"Which one?"

"Either," Carolyn said. "Have you talked to Lupo today?"

"No, but he said he'd be here by eight. He's pretty anxious to get on Carl's trail."

"What about Hayes?" Mike asked suspiciously.

And I suppose he had good reason to be suspicious. Until yesterday, she and I had been joined at the hip for nearly two weeks.

"She should be here soon," I said vaguely.

"We researched Carl last night," Carolyn said as she sat down at her desk. "We've got a few leads to work on this morning."

"Are you guys sticking with this case?"

"Until something else comes in, yeah," Mike said with a shrug. "I don't know about you, but I'd just as soon get that guy off the streets before he tries something else."

"My guess is that he's hiding out. I think he's going to need a couple of days to recover. She beat him pretty good," I said.

Connie's hands had been bloody and bruised and so had her feet.

Then I couldn't help but wonder about Lauren. The electronic version of her case file didn't contain pictures, but rather just simple facts.

There was no mention of defensive wounds.

Is that why she felt responsible?

Thinking back, I realized that she'd seemed disconnected when taking Connie's statement.

Was she comparing the two scenarios?

She had to know better than that…the instances weren't the same. Connie's attacker thought he was in love with her. He wanted to trust her which made him vulnerable.

Rape was all about power and dominance…not to mention the guy had kept a gun to her head. If she'd fought back, she might very well have been killed.

"Bernard?"

"Yeah?" I asked, realizing that I had no idea about the current conversation.

"Are you okay?" Carolyn asked me.

"I just didn't get much sleep last night," I admitted.

"Again, I ask…where's Hayes?" Logan said with a smile.

And even knowing it would tip him off, I couldn't manage to muster a fake smile in return.

"I'm here."

At the sound of her voice, I looked up from my desk and watched her walk across the squad room.

She looked beautiful. And professional and composed…she definitely had the ability to cover her emotions because I was pretty sure that I still looked like a wreck.

"Eames is grabbing some coffee," she continued. "I ran into him on the way up."

She was avoiding eye contact with me, and instead sat on the edge of Lupo's desk and looked at the Logans expectantly.

"Last day in Major Case," Carolyn commented. "We're going to miss you around here."

"I doubt that," Lauren replied dismissively. "But I'll miss being here, that's for sure."

"We need to plan another double date," Logan said, and it was almost like he was testing her. He said the words and then looked back and forth between us.

That was the thing about hanging out with fellow detectives.

They were always way too damn observant.

"Sure," Lauren answered vaguely. "So where do we start today? Are you guys working this with us, or…"

"We're working it," Carolyn answered. "Mike and I looked up a few things last night, and we found out that his identity, David Camden, is actually a guy he put in prison a few years back. He manipulated the system to wipe out his record and give him a clean credit history and then he started using his social."

"Which means that maybe he did it more than once," Lauren suggested.

"Exactly," Logan agreed. Eames came into the room with a cardboard tray full of coffees and began distributing them as Logan continued. "So we figured that if we pull up the record of everyone who Carl's put away, we might be able to find another alias."

"Right, because he was too well organized. I mean, you guys should've seen that room he built," Carolyn said. "He had to have come up with a back-up plan in case his Camden identity was discovered."

"Sounds like we're spending the day in the office," Eames remarked.

"Why, what are we looking at?" Lupo asked as he entered the squad room.

He looked as exhausted as I felt, and I wondered if he'd slept, or if he'd stayed awake worrying about when Carl might make another attempt.

I wondered if he wanted to kill him like I wanted to kill Lauren's attacker, and then I wondered how he dealt with that kind of intense emotion.

I studied him while Mike and Carolyn tag-teamed the recap, and then we split into groups.

The Logans went to their desks.

"Last day with me, Eames," Lupo said before either Lauren or I had a chance to redistribute the partnerships. "Maybe you'll learn something."

The two of them went to sit at the Gorens' desks, since according to Carolyn, they weren't going to be coming into the precinct this morning.

"I guess it's you and me," I said cautiously to Lauren.

"One more day and I'll be out of your hair," she said blandly.

"Maybe I don't want you out of my hair," I said in a firm, low tone. "And maybe I really don't like that you insist on being presumptuous."

"It doesn't matter what you want. This is what it is. So let's just do our jobs, okay?"

No, not okay.

But considering our location, for the time being, I nodded my head and we got to work.

TBC...


	39. Chapter 39

**Lupo POV**

* * *

><p>"Let's get married."<p>

"I…kind of thought that was already the plan."

"No, I mean I don't want to wait. Let's do it this weekend."

We were still in the emergency room, but now we were just waiting on the doctor's discharge orders.

By emergency room standards, it had been a fairly short visit, but still…after Connie's ordeal this afternoon, I could tell that she was exhausted and ready to go home.

I scooted the hard, plastic visitor's chair over next to the gurney that doubled as a bed in the tiny little exam room, and I grabbed onto her left hand.

The one that was conspicuously devoid of my grandmother's diamond ring.

I held her hand gently in mine because hers looked scraped and swollen and sore, the ring finger in particular.

"I know you're upset about him taking the ring," I said gently.

"Upset? You think I'm upset?" she questioned, and from the tone of her voice, I was wondering if maybe she was experiencing a delayed hysterical reaction.

And, I mean, that was fine. She deserved to have an emotional response, especially considering what a great job she'd done of stifling it during the actual crisis.

It'd taken a dozen stitches to fix the knife wound to her stomach, and nearly that many more to sew up her foot. She had countless bruises and she was still bloody and dirty, but she was most definitely not beaten.

She looked at me with fire in her eyes as she attempted to better explain her emotions.

"Upset doesn't describe what I'm feeling right now," she continued. "I'm furious and indignant and betrayed and irritated with myself for not sensing danger from him. And you know what else? And maybe this isn't the part that should stick out in my mind right now, but it does. I'm sick to death of people always being surprised that the two of us are together. You're such a good man. If anything, it should come as a shock that _you_ put up with _me,_ but no…just because I'm…I don't know. A lawyer, I guess. Or because I have to dress nice for work, or because I give the impression that I'm high-strung or…_whatever _people just assume that you're not good enough for me, but you know, the truth is, that it's the other way around. I have a really hard time trying to be good enough for _you_."

"Connie," I interrupted gently. "Stop. You can't let it bother you, what other people think. And I know that I did for awhile, always wondering what people were saying about how you'd lowered your standards, but I honestly don't care anymore. As long as you're happy with me, then I'm good, because your opinion is the only one that matters to me."

"You want my opinion?" she asked, shifting in the bed so that she could turn towards me, putting her legs off the side. "I want to be married to you as soon as possible."

I let go of her hand and stood up so that I could wrap my arms around her.

"So that we can prove something to people?" I questioned.

"You don't know the things he said," she admitted, relaxing fully against me.

Her adrenaline was finally starting to wear off, and even though she'd described the nuts and bolts of what had happened, she hadn't really gotten into their conversations yet.

"About me?"

"I think he's almost as obsessed with you as he is with me. Maybe even more so. Except that he kept telling me how much better he is than you, and how he couldn't understand what I was doing with you…Lupo, he actually critiqued our love-making…in detail."

"Should I ask how I rated?" I asked, trying to coax a smile from her.

"No, but he determined that I like it rough. He was going to show me that he's a better lover than you…"

And then, finally, she started to cry.

I'd been waiting for that, hoping it would come sooner rather than later.

She needed to talk about it, to get it out, and the longer it festered, the worse it would be. The fact that she was able to open up to me after only a few hours was a very good thing.

So I stood next to the bed, just holding her while she cried and vented about the things Carl had said to her.

Shortly after her emotional outpouring, the doctor came in to tell us that she could go home.

I was extra cautious as I drove us home, and then even more so while we went upstairs to our apartment. I thoroughly checked the place out for any signs of an intruder, not completely convinced that Carl wouldn't try something else.

"You think he'll come here?" she asked me when I finally gave her the okay to enter the apartment past the foyer.

"I hope so," I said confidently. "Because I've got something for him, if he does."

"I don't want you to kill him," she said calmly as she carefully hobbled into the kitchen.

"You don't?" I questioned as I followed her, wanting to help her, but knowing that she wanted to do it herself. "Even if he tries to break into our apartment?"

"No. I want to do it."

"No you don't," I argued lightly. "That's not your thing."

"Yeah. Right," she said with no small amount of derision. "It's my thing to bring him up on charges so that he can skate or make a deal and be back out on the street again in three years. I'm starting to rethink this whole DA thing, Lupo. I really am."

"No, you're not," I countered gently. "You love your job."

"I do, but…" she paused and turned around to look at me, the frustration all over her face. "God, Lupo, how did I not see it? I've worked beside him for years."

"You didn't see it because he didn't want you to. And I guess today he realized that we were about to bring the hammer down, so he had to make his move."

"He completely snapped," she agreed.

"That's what stalkers usually do. At some point, they have to quit watching and start doing something about it."

She nodded slowly and then put her arms around me. I took a deep breath and ran my hands over her back, holding her close.

I hadn't let the reality of the situation fully hit me yet, either, but I could hold it together a little longer.

Until after we put Carl behind bars.

"So does that mean we can't get married this weekend?" she asked quietly, her cheek pressed against my chest.

I chuckled lightly, appreciating her need to be connected to me.

"Sweetheart, you name the time and place, and I'll be there."

I held her for a few minutes longer, and then together we went into the bedroom where we stripped out of our clothes and climbed exhaustedly into the bed.

My neighbor had Otto for the night. I'd called earlier to make the request, because I had no idea how long we'd be at the hospital, but now the apartment seemed quiet without him. But then again, I wouldn't have wanted to leave Connie alone while I walked him, and she wasn't exactly up for putting excessive pressure on her foot, so…I guess his absence was a good thing for now.

Connie moved up against me in the bed, snuggling close against my side.

"You've got your gun under the mattress?" she asked me, her voice barely a whisper.

"Yeah," I admitted. "Go to sleep. I've got you."

I stayed awake most of the night while Connie slept fitfully next to me.

I thought about all kinds of things, asking myself numerous questions to which I had very few answers.

But my main concern was catching Carl.

Now that his identity had been revealed, the danger was even greater. He'd be in desperation mode by now, and I didn't expect that he'd be willing to walk away from Connie, even though that would be the smart thing to do. Hell, if he packed up and hit the road, it was very possible that we'd never find him.

But she'd rebuffed him. And she'd physically hurt him.

He'd want retribution.

I reached out and shut off the alarm before it rang, and then got up from the bed, leaving Connie still asleep. I looked at her for a minute, the red, chafed skin on her wrists from the duct tape, the bruises on her hands…it hit me hard just how close I'd come to losing her.

Maybe she was onto something with this whole rushed-wedding thing.

Because August seemed like a long way off, and I really wanted to be married to her. I wanted our commitment to each other to be splashed across the headlines of every newspaper. And yeah, okay, so it would actually only be a tiny blurb on page forty-six, but still…

I left the bedroom and made a pass through the apartment, just to make sure all was well before I hopped in the shower. I kept it quick, not wanting to leave her alone for long, but when I shut off the water and pulled back the curtain, there she was, leaning against the counter.

"I'm going into work today," she said. "Mike's probably going crazy, what with losing two ADA's in the same day, and the virus in the system…"

"I spoke with him last night," I told her. "He doesn't expect you to come in."

I'd called him shortly after finding Connie, to let him know that she was safe. As jealous as I'd been of him in the past, I appreciated his attachment to her in a platonic sense. He'd conceded the fact that the two of them would never be romantic, so there was no reason for me to hold a grudge.

And he'd been kind enough to drive Mulder back to Secaucus last night.

"I'm sure he doesn't," she agreed. "But what else am I going to do? Sit around here all day?"

In the end, we struck a deal.

I took her to work, where a couple of uniforms met us at the door, and they agreed to stick with her until I came back to pick her up.

"Don't do too much," I told her as I hugged her goodbye. "And don't try to ditch your security detail."

"Yes, sir," she said with a smile.

Her toughness was amazing. I almost think that Carl screwed up by dragging out the prelude, because if he'd caught her completely off-guard, it might have been a worse experience for her.

As it was, by the time he'd made his move, she was so pissed off by all of the threats that it had changed her emotional response to one more of anger than fear.

She stepped back from me, but I picked up her hand and kissed the back of it, reluctant to let her go.

"I'll keep you posted," I promised. "We're going to end this thing, and then we'll take some time off, okay? Maybe take a trip to Miami."

"Or Vegas," she joked. "We can take our vows from Elvis."

So I left her at the DA's office and got to 1PP in time to catch the tail end of the morning briefing.

"Sounds like we're spending the day in the office," I heard Eames say.

"Why, what are we looking at?" I asked.

Mike and Carolyn looked fired up, as though they were onto something, and I was grateful for their continued assistance on the case. I hoped that no one else got killed any time soon so that they could keep working it with us.

They filled me in on how they'd tracked Carl's fake identity to someone he'd put in prison. It was going to take a lot of searching to find another potential alias, but it was something, which was more than I thought we had.

I asked if Alex and Bobby were going to be joining us, but Carolyn said no.

"They said they had something to take care of this morning," she answered vaguely.

They were probably off solving the Black Dahlia murder, or unlocking the secrets to the City of Atlantis.

And maybe that sounds like I'm being a smartass, but I'm not. How those two came up with some of the things they did was a modern-day mystery. I was just glad that they worked for the good guys.

So after we established our plan of attack, the Logans went back to their desks.

It only took me a second to see that Bernard looked like hell and Hayes was avoiding all eye contact, so I snagged Eames and went to sit at the Gorens' desks.

"Last day with me, Eames," I said. "Maybe you'll learn something."

I glanced sideways at Bernard as I sat down in Alex's chair. I hadn't talked with him nearly enough in recent days, and I was curious as to what was going on with him.

"I guess it's you and me," I heard him say to Hayes.

"One more day and I'll be out of your hair," she said told him.

And that really surprised me.

I'd never seen her act anything but friendly and upbeat, especially around Bernard. Well, after that first day anyway. But still…something was definitely amiss.

I couldn't hear Bernard's whispered response, so I made a mental note to take him out for a beer later, and then I got to work.

Because I was going to catch Carl today if it killed me.

TBC...


	40. Chapter 40

**Alex POV**

* * *

><p>We were leaving the apartment when my cell phone rang.<p>

Considering it was only seven-thirty in the morning, I couldn't help but wonder who was in trouble now.

"Goren," I answered as I walked with Bobby to the elevator.

"Detective, it's Mike Cutter. I hate to bother you so early, especially when yesterday was so…well, hectic."

"That's an understatement," I commented. "But it's fine. We're actually on our way to the office now."

"Can you make a detour by the DA's office? I could use your help on a matter."

I hesitated, but only because his request had taken me by surprise, so then he added, "I just need to get affidavits from both you and the other Detective Goren. I'll try not to take up too much of your time."

"Affidavits? Concerning what case?"

"Do you remember Jocelyn Moser?"

"How could I forget? She tried to knock Bobby out with a baseball bat and then she set her house on fire."

"That's the one," he said with a chuckle. "Yeah, I was pretty sure you'd remember her. Anyway, with our latest system snafu, we suffered some file damage. Mulder's assured me that he can recover everything, but there's a hearing scheduled for this afternoon, and I'd hate to cut it down to the last minute, so..."

"Sure," I agreed quickly.

I had no problem taking a small part of our day to make sure that woman got locked up. She'd trafficked in young girls, dangling the prospect of citizenship over their heads while selling them for sex to the highest bidder.

"I'm just coming through the tunnel now, but I should be at the office in another twenty minutes. Can you meet me there?"

"No problem," I said easily. "Tunnel?"

I knew for a fact that Cutter lived in lower Manhattan.

"I had to go back to Jersey to pick up Mulder," he told me, and I could tell that he wanted to say more, but that he was holding back since the subject of our discussion was presently in the vehicle with him.

"Okay," I said, barely stifling a laugh. "We'll meet you at your office."

I hung up the phone as we got to the SUV.

"So, we're going to Cutter's office to offer our statements on Jocelyn Moser?" Bobby questioned.

He doesn't miss much, even only catching one side of the conversation.

"That bug Carl unleashed on their computers apparently deleted random files," I explained. "Although Cutter's on his way back from Jersey with Lupo's black ops guy."

"I'm having trouble imagining what the conversation in that car might be like," he mused with a grin.

"I bet it's one-sided. Neither one probably has any idea what the other is saying. I wonder if Connie is going to work today."

"You would."

"True. Well, if she is, we can give her back her bracelet."

By some miracle, I'd found it on the street yesterday. It was outside of the building where Bernard had found blood. Bobby and I had walked over the area repeatedly, looking for signs of…well, anything. I'd spotted the delicate etched gold chain on the pavement, incredibly undamaged.

Well, the clasp was broken, but that must have happened either from Carl grabbing onto her wrist, or maybe she'd done it herself.

Either way, I knew right away that it was hers. Lupo had bought it for her for Valentine's Day. Bobby had taken a few minutes to fix the clasp this morning, so we'd be able to give it back to her intact.

I called Carolyn to let her know that we'd be in a little later.

"That's fine," she said. "I've been working on a way to track Carl, and I think I might have something. Unless another case comes in, Mike and I are going to stick with this."

"That sounds like a good idea," I agreed. I hung up with her and commented to Bobby, "She's staying busy to avoid having to think about Jack."

"She can't avoid it forever. He's not going to go away."

"I know. But if we can get through until the weekend, then the four of us can devote some time to getting more details. And Liz should be looking through Jack's wife's lab work today, so maybe something in there will be a clue to… something. I'm telling you…the man's not that smart. He's made a mistake somewhere and he probably knows it."

"Thus the reason for the full-on blitz attack," Bobby said thoughtfully.

"Don't you think?"

"I think we just need to take him out," he replied firmly. "Before Mike gets his hands on him."

Fifteen minutes later, I found a place to park down the street from the DA's office. I had a feeling that we'd beat Cutter, so we took a moment to stop across the street and grab a couple of coffees, and then we went inside and up to Cutter's office. Connie's desk was located in the area outside of his office, and not surprisingly, she was already sitting down, hard at work.

Two uniformed cops were lurking in the general vicinity, and I was glad to see them. I could understand why she wanted to be back at work, but it didn't need to be at the risk of her own safety.

Not that I thought for one second that Lupo would let her get away with coming to this place unguarded, but still…

I knew first hand just how hard-headed women could be sometimes.

"How's the foot doing?" I asked her as I approached her desk and nudged a hip up on the edge.

"It's manageable," she answered. "At least it gives me an excuse to not wear heels. Did Lupo send you two to check up on me? Because I've only been here a few minutes," she added with a smile.

"No, we're actually here on business," Bobby told her as he reached into his pocket and pulled out her bracelet. "But we also thought you might like this back."

"You found it," she said in surprise.

"You left it behind on purpose?" I asked her.

"Yeah, I…I don't know. I guess I thought it might help," she answered shyly. "Pretty stupid, huh?"

"Not stupid at all," I argued lightly, watching as Bobby hooked the piece of jewelry back onto her wrist. Most men are clumsy with things like that, especially something so delicate, but Bobby's not most men. He easily hooked it into place.

"Thank you," she said quietly, her focus still on the bracelet. "I never thought I'd get it back."

"One down, one to go, right?" I remarked. She brought her eyes up to mine and smiled uneasily.

"I hope so."

"Detectives," Cutter greeted as he came into the room, followed closely by who I could only assume was the now-infamous Mulder. "I appreciate you coming in. If you'll give me just a minute to get organized, we can get started."

After taking a moment to inquire about Connie's well-being, he breezed on into his office, leaving the gangly kid standing awkwardly nearby.

"So, um…I'm really sorry," he said to Connie.

"What are you sorry for?"

"Two inches," he answered, shaking his head slowly before picking up rhythm. "I mean, dude…how hard is it to factor in the slope of opposing sidewalks when determining a height comparison? It should've been fucking hopscotch, but no…I had to pucker the digits and hand you over to the fucking fisher king…"

"Mulder," Connie interrupted. "It's not your fault. And it's because of you that Lupo was able to get to me as fast as he did. So thank you."

She got up from her chair and kissed him on the cheek, causing him to immediately flush the color of a fire truck.

Me, I was just intrigued by his lingo and by his seemingly intense loyalty to Connie and Lupo.

"Lupo's the real deal," Mulder said with a nod.

"McClane, right?" Connie asked him with a smile.

"You know, don'tcha, Ten?" he asked, finally looking a little more at ease now that he knew Connie didn't blame him.

She barked out a laugh and then sat back down in her chair.

"You need to get out more, Mulder," she teased.

"From the sound of it, you might be spending a few days here," Bobby commented. "The virus did some damage, huh?"

"Oh, I got it covered. On the drive over, I thought of a way to toss a sheep at that bitch and send it running. Shouldn't take me too long. And since I've got the digits on his launching IP, I can take a peek all up in that shit and see what he's been playing with, right? Then I can slide around the I's and O's from his other house."

"Detectives, I'm ready if you are," Cutter called out. "And Mulder, if you want to get started on that computer over there, I'd appreciate it."

He pointed to an empty desk a few feet away, and then he stood in the doorway while Bobby and I walked over to his office.

"I had him until he started throwing sheep," Bobby mumbled to me.

"He's going to trick the virus," I explained with a smirk.

"Oh, so you understand that guy?" Cutter asked me under his breath as he closed his door behind us.

"He sounds like one of my nephews," I explained. "I'd say that socially, your in-house computer genius is about twelve years old."

Once inside, we got down to business, with Bobby and me recounting our experience with Jocelyn Moser. It didn't take too long, considering it wasn't something that either of us was likely to forget any time soon. I could still remember distinctly the fear that I felt when I had to leave Bobby to chase after Jocelyn, all the while not knowing his status and yet still having to put the job first.

I'm not so sure that I'd do the same thing today.

When we were nearly finished, I got a text from Liz.

_**Where are you? Can you stop by the morgue?**_

I hadn't spoken with her since early yesterday, and I was curious to see how Jeremy had reacted to our suggestion of hypnosis, so I quickly sent a reply.

_**We'll be there within the hour.**_

"I think that should take care of it," Cutter said as he sat back in his chair. "I appreciate your time."

"We'll be around, if you need one of us to testify," Bobby offered. "Whatever it takes to make sure she doesn't get off."

"I'll let you know," Cutter said, getting up from his chair to shake our hands across his desk.

I was struck by the similarities and differences between him and Carver.

Arrogance and elegance were common factors, but where Carver was self-aggrandizing and condescending, Cutter was down-to-earth and a team player.

I'd take Cutter any day.

Because, of course, Carver was a criminal, too.

And now that Cutter no longer appeared to be lusting after Connie, I didn't feel like it was a betrayal to befriend him.

So we left his office and tossed a goodbye in Mulder's direction before stopping by Connie's desk again.

"We're out," I told her. "You need anything?"

"No, I'm good," she said sincerely. "But thanks."

Twenty minutes later, we got to the morgue.

"How was Baltimore?"

"Good and bad, and I'm not sure which one outweighs the other," she replied distractedly. "But that's not why I called you. I mean, I may need help on that front before too long, if I happen to get arrested for lying to the police in an ongoing investigation, but…"

"Wait, you lied to the cops? Why?"

"I'll get back to that. First this," she said, holding up a lab report.

"What is it?"

"It's Carolyn's DNA."

"What?"

"Cher's killer," she clarified. "The police collected evidence found at the scene, including a brunette hair. It's listed as having been found in an eight-centimeter puddle of blood in the kitchen, where the scuffle apparently took place. The blood was what made the cops suspect foul play, even though they didn't find the victim until six months later."

"And almost four hundred miles away," Bobby mused.

Cher's body had been recovered in Pisgah National Forest, even though she'd lived in Jacksonville at the time of her disappearance.

"Well, time and distance don't change the facts. The hair found was brunette and the victim was blonde."

"And the hair is definitely Carolyn's?" Bobby asked, clearly as dumbfounded as me.

"I ran it through the system, even though at the time, the lab didn't get a hit when they ran it."

"So why is her DNA even in the system?" I questioned. "I mean, prints I can understand, but DNA? They might keep a database on military personnel now, but they didn't in the eighties."

"Exactly. So I checked."

"And?"

"And it was entered into the system as part of an investigation last fall in North Carolina. Ring any bells?"

"That son of a bitch," I muttered. "Unbelievable. But how in the hell…"

"He planted it back then," Bobby said quietly. "He gave it to Slater and told him to leave it there as a failsafe. If any heat came onto them, then they could point a finger in the direction of the jealous former mistress."

"But when did she stop seeing him? I mean, do I even want to know why he still had a piece of her hair?"

Bobby caught my eye, and it wasn't hard to see the concern.

"This guy is even crazier than we thought."

TBC...


	41. Chapter 41

**Ross POV**

* * *

><p>I don't know what Liz was thinking, lying to the detective like that.<p>

Because Liz never lies.

About anything.

So the fact that she provided a fabricated alibi for my son, who was now apparently a suspect in a second murder…I couldn't decide how to feel about that.

The cop in me wanted to shake her senseless and ask her if she'd completely lost her mind.

The father in me was nearly overwhelmed by emotion at the fact that she'd violated her own moral code in an effort to make my son's life just a little bit easier.

"Liz, you shouldn't have done that," Jeremy spoke up.

Again, I was overcome by my feelings, this time pride in my son for not accepting her offer of an easy out.

"You know they think you did it," she said.

"But I didn't. I didn't even see him tonight," Jeremy insisted, and I could see that the reality of the situation was sinking in.

Another of his classmates had been murdered, and once again he was the prime suspect.

Which meant _what_?

Someone had it in for him specifically?

Or did he just have a bad habit of being in the wrong place at the wrong time?

"Tell us what happened," I said calmly.

We were still on campus, walking back to the car. I decided that even though it was late, maybe it would be better to drive back home tonight.

The BPD had my contact information.

If they wanted a statement from Jeremy, they'd get it.

But my initial plan of going to the precinct in the morning so that Jeremy could tell them about his recovered memory of Kenny having been in the room that night…well, it was probably better if we didn't offer up that information at the moment.

Now that Kenny was dead, I mean.

It would be like Jeremy handing the cops a motive on a silver platter.

"I sent him a text, and told him that I wanted to meet up with him."

"Did he reply?"

"Yeah, he said sure, and so I told him nine o'clock in the quad."

"That's a fairly public choice of venue for such a personal confrontation," I stated. "Why'd you pick it?"

Jeremy looked down at the ground for a minute and then back up at me.

"Because I was afraid of what I might do to him if I got him alone."

"Are you sure that he's the one who killed Kelly?"

"No. I mean, I thought so. He was there. I remember that. He's the one who pushed me off when…well, when we were…"

"Okay," I said. "So he was in the room, and he's the one who bruised your back."

"Right," he agreed. "But if he's the killer, then who killed him?"

"You mean who other than you has motive?" I asked. "Good question. What else do you remember?"

"Not much," he admitted, shaking his head. "That's why I wanted to talk to Kenny. I was going to let him think that I remembered everything, and see what I could get out of him. Because, Dad…he knows. He doesn't drink or do drugs and he was there. So even if it wasn't him, he _knows_."

"And now _he's_ dead. The one person who knows the truth."

"Which is why the cops are going to want to pin this on you," Liz said to Jeremy. "That's why I told them you were with us. Otherwise, you'd be behind bars right now."

"I know, but Liz…" he began, looking at her with open admiration.

"You shouldn't have lied," I finished. "But I'm glad you did. It bought us a little time."

Probably not the smartest words spoken by a man of my position, but what's done was done, so now we were going to run with it.

So we went back to New York.

During the drive, the three of us agreed to go over the facts as we knew them.

"Let's talk about this and pretend I'm not your father, okay?" I proposed. "Right now, I'm a cop."

"Okay," he said cautiously.

"So I'm going to ask the questions, and you're going to answer. No hesitation, no fear of repercussions or consequences, just honest answers."

"I got it, Dad. Go ahead."

I was anxious to get Jeremy in with Skoda, but I thought maybe rapid-fire questions might trigger the same response, since he'd already started to get his memory back.

I wished that I had the Gorens with me in the car to take over this type of hard core interrogation, but I didn't, so it was time for me to man up.

I got things rolling by starting with the easy questions.

"This girl that Bobby and Alex interviewed...Cierra. How well do you know her?

"Not very, but she was Kelly's roommate, so she was around a lot."

"Did she ever come on to you?"

"Sure, but she's a dime-store pony."

I cast a sideways glance at Liz, and she mouthed the word _easy_.

How did she know this stuff?

"She's friends with Kenny," I stated.

"Cierra? What does she have to do with this?"

"I'm not sure. She's on the suspect list."

"She didn't kill Kenny."

"How do you know?"

"I went to the dorm tonight. I was going to go in to try to find Kenny, but then I ended up texting him instead. Anyway, I ran into a friend of Kelly's. She's also friends with Cierra, and she told me that Cierra had borrowed her car so that she could go home for the weekend."

"Okay. So let's talk about Kenny. Did he ever talk to you about Kelly?"

"No. But he talked to Kelly all the time. He avoided me, I think."

"Because you were the competition?"

"I guess."

"Last Friday night…Kelly showed up at the frat house. Did you see Cierra there?"

"No."

"Kenny?"

"Not until later, when he was in the room with us."

"Was the room empty when you got there?"

"Yes. Wait. No. I'm not sure."

"Was the window open?" Liz asked, jumping into the line of questioning. I was glad that she decided to join in, because it usually worked better when the questions were thrown at the subject from two different directions.

"Yes."

"You're sure?"

"Yeah, I'm sure. It was cool in the room. It felt good, because it had been hot downstairs."

"Good," I said encouragingly. "So the window was open. You and Kelly went in and closed the door behind you."

"Right."

"Did you lock it?"

"No."

"You told Detective Goren that you couldn't remember."

"I couldn't, but I remember now. She…Kelly told me to lock it, and I said no."

"Why?"

"I was teasing her. I told her that I didn't care who saw us."

"What did she say to that?"

"She started kissing me," he answered quietly. "And she said…something about Kenny."

"Kenny? Why would she bring him up at a time like that?"

"She said that if someone was going to walk in on us, then she hoped it was him," he said, slowly as though he was just now hearing her words in his head. "Because that way, he'd get the hint."

"That she was with you."

"Yeah, and so then I asked her why she couldn't just tell him."

"You fought about Kenny," I stated.

"Low key, but yeah. I was annoyed with her. She was always so _nice_ to everybody. She said she didn't want to hurt his feelings."

"So how did you go from fighting to having sex?"

"Dad…"

"Not Dad."

He sighed and ran his hand over his face in a gesture I recognized as my own.

"That's when she started talking about New York, and how she wanted us to live together after college. She said that…that she loved me."

I paused in my questioning as Jeremy's emotions got the better of him. I needed to know the facts, but not like this.

We could wait for Skoda to try hypnosis.

"That's good for tonight," I told him.

"No," he argued. "No, I think it's working. Keep going."

"Jeremy…"

"She said that she loved me. And I hugged her and told her that I loved her, too. We started kissing again, and then we got on the bed, and…and…"

"You stopped to get a condom from your wallet," Liz supplied.

"Yeah, but…it wasn't in my wallet."

"The police logged in the contents of your wallet," I told him. "It listed three condoms."

"I mean, I got up because I'd tossed my jeans onto the floor, so I went to get my wallet from the back pocket, but when I reached down…it was…there was one lying on my jeans."

"A condom?"

"Yeah," he answered, sounding confused. "I made a joke about it…something about how they just magically appeared in a frat house."

Which explained the mismatched brands.

And also said that at least by that point, someone else was in the room.

But Jeremy and Kelly, both high and distracted by their recent declarations of love, hadn't even realized it.

"You think Kenny put it there?"

"No."

"Why not? You know it had been tampered with, right?"

"I know, but no…he was yelling."

"Kenny? That night?"

"Yeah. But I mean, this was later because me and Kelly…we…we just finished and Kenny was somehow _right_ there. He pushed me off of her, and started yelling _what are you doing_ and I tried to get up, but my face was shoved into the mattress and I couldn't move. And she was…she was laughing."

"Kelly?"

"Yeah. No. I don't know. She was laughing and crying at the same time and…"

He trailed off, completely lost in the memory, so I let it go.

Liz reached over and grabbed onto my hand, but remained quiet for the duration of the trip.

When we got back to the city, it was nearly three-thirty in the morning.

Each of us managed to get a few hours of sleep and then Liz and I got ready to go to work.

I went into the kitchen for some coffee and found Jeremy already seated at the table.

I was surprised that he was even up, considering how late we'd gotten home, but from the looks of him, his sleep had been fitful at best.

"How're you doing?" I asked him.

"It's driving me crazy that I can't remember," he admitted. "I keep hearing laughter in my head, but that doesn't make any sense, does it?"

"You're close to piecing it together," I assured him.

"Maybe. But it feels like the more I think about it, the more it slips away."

"You need to think about something else," Liz suggested as she came into the room. "That's what I do. Refocus your concentration and let the back of your mind work on solving the puzzle."

"And that works?"

"Usually," she said, leaning over to kiss the top of his head.

"I'll call you as soon as I can set up the appointment," I told him as I headed for the door. "Until then, hit the books. You've got finals in another week."

"Are you sure it's even going to matter?"

"I'm sure," I said firmly.

I drove Liz to the morgue, and she paused for a minute before getting out of the car.

"What kind of trouble am I looking at?" she asked me.

"From the Baltimore PD? Obstruction of justice carries a penalty of up to twenty years in prison."

"Thank you," she replied drolly. "I feel so much better now."

"I can't believe you did that," I said for the umpteenth time.

"Don't you think he's gone through enough? And you know as well as I do that the BPD would've railroaded him on this most recent murder just like they tried to do on the last one."

"But you know they're going to find out, right? I mean, surely someone saw Jeremy walking around campus, or in the quad waiting on Kenny. Surely they've found the text messages on Kenny's phone. They'll know Jeremy wanted to meet up with him…"

"I know. But I'm trying to protect him," she insisted. "If they want to prosecute me for obstruction, then fine."

She turned to get out of the car, but I called her name and she turned back towards me.

"What you did for him…it means a lot."

"My willingness to wear an orange jumpsuit?"

"I'm serious, Liz. We're skirting on the edge of the law right now, and it may come back to bite us in the ass, but..."

"But we're all in this together," she said firmly. "And Jeremy is innocent."

"You believed that from the beginning. Even when I wasn't sure."

"You were sure," she countered, reaching out to touch my cheek. "It's just that you've seen too many other parents blindsided by the actions of their kids…you didn't want to trust your instincts for fear of being wrong."

She kissed me, stalling my response to her astute observation, and then she climbed out of the car.

"Hey, Liz," I called out again. She ducked down, looking in through the still-open door. "Let's see what happens at Skoda's, and then we'll get a lawyer and go back down to Baltimore to get this whole thing sorted out."

TBC...


	42. Chapter 42

**Carolyn POV**

* * *

><p>I worked relentlessly to find another potential alias for Carl Babbitt.<p>

And I know enough about psychology to know that I was using him as a substitute for Jack, but whatever.

He still needed to be caught, so what difference did it make?

He was a higher priority than Jack at the moment anyway, because so far, Jack hadn't threatened to do anything to me physically.

Carl, on the other hand, was a ticking time bomb.

"Here you go, sweetheart," Mike said quietly, scooting a fresh cup of coffee into my line of sight. He pulled his chair up close to mine so that he could see my monitor. "Any hits while I was gone?"

"I'm working on a maybe here," I said distractedly. "Give me just another second."

I was presently tracking down Larry Grindle.

He was sent upstate in 2005, but I'd uncovered recent credit checks for that name, which shouldn't have happened since he was still in prison.

But there were innocuous possibilities for such an anomaly, so I was pulling the credit report to track the history.

"It'll take a minute for the report to come through, but I may have a hit," I said as I picked up my coffee and sat back in the chair.

"After striking out for two hours, a hit will be nice," he replied.

We both looked up as Bernard and Hayes entered the squad room, each carrying a can of soda. They studiously ignored each other as they resumed their positions at Bernard and Lupo's desks.

"And what's up with them?" Mike whispered.

"What do you mean?"

"You don't know anything about it? Is your radar down?" he teased gently.

"It's been malfunctioning lately," I conceded. "So tell me."

"Well, I may have overheard a little bit of an argument when I went to get our coffees."

"You _may_ have?" I asked with a smile. "Mike, you were eavesdropping."

"I didn't mean to. I just sort of walked into it, and then I didn't want to interrupt, so I waited outside the break room for a minute."

"And listened."

He shrugged and grinned unrepentantly.

"Do you want to know or not?"

"Of course," I replied quickly.

And maybe I should feel a little bad that I was going to use their drama as an escape from my personal nightmare, but it was more than that.

I owed Lauren for hearing my confession and keeping my secret, and if she was having a problem, then maybe it would be a chance for me to repay the favor.

And it's not like I expected that Mike had heard juicy details about something.

Both Bernard and Hayes should know better than to get into too much while still in 1PP. This time it was only Mike who'd heard, but it could've been anyone, so they'd most likely kept their topic cryptic.

"Okay, get this. She said _I don't know what gives you the right_, and let me tell you, she sounded _pissed_."

"What did he say?"

"He said _because I care about you_."

"He really likes her, doesn't he?"

"Well, yeah," he answered with certainty. "And I thought she liked him."

"She does."

"She didn't sound like it. After he said that, she told him that he needed to drop it."

"Drop what?"

"I don't know. But then she said _I mean it – call Olivia and end it right now_."

"Olivia? He's seeing someone else?"

"Sweetheart, your guess is as good as mine."

"I can't believe he'd do that," I said distractedly.

I'd encouraged Lauren to move things forward with Bernard because I thought he was a good guy, and yet he was cheating on her?

And maybe I couldn't call it that just yet because I wasn't exactly sure as to the specifics of their relationship, but still…in my book, a man shouldn't be entertaining lascivious thoughts with more than one woman at a time.

"I don't think he would," Mike said. "It's got to be something else."

"What else did he say?"

"That's where it gets weird. He said _if it means that much to you, I will_."

"As if he thought she wouldn't care about the other woman?" I asked in confusion. "No, you know what? We've stepped way over the line here. I'm going to forget everything you just said."

As I said the words, I looked over to where they were sitting, her with her head down and him with his gaze bouncing back and forth between the computer and her.

I couldn't see her face, but his looked distraught.

And maybe I didn't know him as well as I'd like, but I was still pretty sure that he was a really good guy.

And what was it that Mike had heard first? Lauren had said what gives you the right? That's not usually an opener when confronting a cheating boyfriend. No, it was something else.

_And none of my business,_ I reminded myself.

As tempting as it was to get lost in their problems instead of my own, I forced those thoughts from my mind. It wasn't easy, but it helped when my computer alerted me to the incoming credit report.

"Hey, Mike," I said cautiously as I read over the words.

"What've you got?"

"Larry Grindle. A six-year resident of Dannemora, and yet in the past year, he's gotten two credit cards and he opened a bank account in the Bronx."

"Run him. What's the current address?" he asked excitedly, wheeling his chair back over next to mine.

"I'm pulling it…there. Gleason Avenue in the Bronx," I said, getting up from my chair. "Lupo! I've got a hit!"

Lupo was up and standing in front of my desk in less than two seconds, and Eames was right behind him.

"Where? Let's go!"

"It could be a bust," I warned. "But this guy fits the parameters."

"It's better than sitting on our asses for another two hours. Come on, let's go check it out."

"Wait, I think we might have something, too," Bernard spoke up.

"We do," Lauren said quickly. She reached over to the printer and jerked out the paper as it ejected from the spindle. "Look. Thomas Croft. He went to Sing Sing in January 2008, but last year, he applied for an apartment lease, and the credit report was cleaned dating back to prior to his incarceration date. There's a new bank account…credit cards…"

"Damn, we go for hours with nothing, and now we've got two. Where's your guy live?" Mike asked Bernard.

My phone buzzed, so I pulled it and looked at the text from Alex.

_**Are you at 1PP? We need to talk – it's urgent.**_

"New Hyde Park."

"Mike, we need to stay here," I said. "We'll keep working."

"Are you sure? It's your lead," Lupo offered.

"No, go ahead."

"Okay," he said with a nod. "Bernard, you two go check out Croft, and Eames and I will head up to the Bronx."

"Sounds good," I agreed. "Keep us posted, and we'll see what else we can find."

So the two pairs of detectives left 1PP in a hurry while I typed a reply to Alex.

_**We're here. We'll wait for you.**_

"What's going on?" Mike asked in concern.

"I got a text from Alex. She said they need to see us and that it's urgent."

"That's not good," he mused.

"They were going by the morgue this morning, after their meeting with Cutter," I said slowly. "And I can't imagine the thing with Cutter prompted the urgent message. It's Quarles' wife's case. Liz found something."

"That's fine. We wanted her to find something, right? We can deal with anything as long as we know what it is. It's the unknown that's hard to defend against."

"Yeah," I relied vaguely. "Yeah, but what could it be? I didn't even know the woman, and I wasn't still with Jack when she was killed."

Twenty minutes later, I had my answer.

"He kept my hair?" I asked.

Why was it that this new fact almost creeped me out more than the pictures?

I mean, who keeps _hair_?

And when did he even take it in the first place?

"Bobby's theory is that it was a back-up plan for Jack. He sent Slater in to kill Cher, and they planted the hair. Not only did it make the police look for a female suspect, but also, Jack figured he could enter your DNA into the system any time the cops got too close, so that they'd get a hit on it," Alex explained.

"Liz said it was just logged into the system last fall, supposedly in conjunction with an investigation going on in Asheville."

"So he was already plotting to set me up when I was down there," I said, shaking my head in amazement.

"Maybe, maybe not. But he was obviously disappointed by your lack of interest in rekindling your relationship. And he had to figure that putting the DNA in the system at this late date would only mean you'd be tied to that murder if someone reopened the investigation. And it was unlikely that anyone would unless he prompted it himself. It's leverage."

"Like the pictures. And Mike's mom. And the bank account," I mumbled. "What did I do to him to deserve all of this?"

"Nothing," Mike said quickly. "You know that. He's a psycho."

"Yeah, well, he's fucking me better now than he ever did back in the day," I said cynically.

Mike barked out a laugh, and I looked up to see that Alex and Bobby were both biting back smiles.

"What?" I asked.

"I'm glad to see you found your sense of humor again," Mike said.

"I wasn't trying to be funny," I argued lightly, but I couldn't help but laugh, too.

I mean, what else was I supposed to do? I'd already gone through the whole gamut of emotions, so maybe it was time to try light-hearted optimism.

"I wonder if he has a voodoo doll of you or something," Alex posed.

"Don't tease her about voodoo. You know she believes in that crap, right?" Mike joked.

"Crap? Come on, Mike. I explained it to you. It's a belief system, just like any religion. How do you think I got you to marry me? I keep a doll of you in my purse."

"Yeah, but does it have my real hair?"

"It's good to see my detectives hard at work."

The four of us stopped like deer in headlights as the chief walked into the squad room, catching us goofing off in the middle of the work day.

And it's not that I thought he'd be mad, but I also didn't want him to think that this was habit, or that we were taking advantage of our friendship.

"We are," I promised. "We were just…blowing off a little steam."

"Yeah, boss," Mike spoke up. "And I'd like to ask you to bump this Quarles thing to Major Case status."

"Mike," I began.

"I'm serious," he insisted. "And I know we were laughing about it, but this guy is twisted and he's coming after you with both barrels, so something needs to be done about it, and right now, we're not focusing enough of our time on catching him."

"Mike's right," Bobby agreed. "If we keep putting it on the back burner, he's going to keep running circles around us."

"Where are we?" Ross asked.

"Jack's wife was murdered five years ago, and since he mentioned her case when he was issuing his threats, I pulled the file and had the evidence sent to Liz."

"And?"

"There was a hair found at the murder scene. At the time, there was no DNA match, but since then, Jack entered my information into the system. Liz ran the hair, and it popped."

"It's yours?"

"Yes, and since prior to that, I'd been having an affair with him…"

"A _long_ time prior to that," Mike clarified.

"Right. Fifteen years prior. But still, considering that the evidence suggests I was at the scene of a former lover's wife's murder…"

"It doesn't look good," he agreed with a nod.

"And that's not all," Alex added, and then she filled him in about the bank account.

"He expects you to pull out the money and give it to him and then what…he's just going to walk away and leave you alone?"

"That's what I said," Mike responded.

"But if we make it an official case, then everything goes into evidence," I argued. "And it'll be a conflict of interest if you let me and Mike work it."

"That's why I'm the chief," he replied. "I get to make decisions like that. It's now a Major Case, and it's yours. I don't care about conflict. Just do it by the book, okay? And as for the evidence…document everything but the pictures for now. If it becomes necessary, we'll talk about it again, okay?"

"Yes, sir. Thank you," I said sincerely.

He nodded and then glanced around the room.

"Connie's stalker case?"

"We got two leads. Bernard and Hayes went to New Hyde Park and Lupo and Eames went to the Bronx. Hopefully one of them is our guy."

"Good. What about you two?" he asked, looking at Bobby and Alex.

"We just got here," Bobby said. "Cutter needed our statements on the Moser case, and then we stopped by the morgue."

"That's right. And Liz mentioned something about an obstruction charge," Alex said leadingly.

"Obstruction?" Mike asked.

"Maybe. We'll see. This thing with Jeremy is really turning ugly. Which is actually why I'm here. I need to be at Skoda's office in an hour, and I've got two new cases that need to be assigned, on top of the fact that I have to arrange for a lawyer to go with us to Baltimore."

"Too bad we don't know any good lawyers," I said smartly.

"I'm not asking Connie. Not after what she's been through."

"Seems to me like a good fit," Mike added. "It'll get her out of town, and take her mind off her problems here. Not to mention she'll make the DA down there look like an idiot."

"I agree with them," Bobby said. "Give us the two new cases. You go to Skoda's and call Connie on your way."

"Is that an order, Detective?" Ross asked with a smirk.

"It's a recommendation from a friend," he corrected. "And if you need more investigative work done in Baltimore…"

"You'll be busy with two new cases," he reminded him.

"Ha," Alex scoffed. "We'll solve those by noon. If you need us, call."

Ross handed off the files and left the squad room.

"Now there goes a man with a lot on his mind," Mike remarked.

"What's going on with the obstruction charge?" I asked.

"Our suspect in Kelly's murder case turned up dead last night, and Liz lied so that she could alibi Jeremy."

"She lied to the cops?"

"I think she's got a soft spot for the boy."

"She'll be fine," Mike said dismissively. "I've got some connections down there. No one in that precinct, but guys with enough brass to rattle the cage if we need to."

"I'll be anxious to hear what Jeremy remembers," Alex commented. "If Skoda can pull the memories from him."

"I wish everything didn't have to happen at once. I'd love to take a drive down to Baltimore and dig into that investigation," I said.

"We've got our work cut out for us, sweetheart. And I'd say we should start with you remembering where you were on the night Cher Quarles was murdered. Our first step to debunking the evidence is to provide solid evidence to the contrary."

"Okay, so what was the exact date?" I asked rhetorically as I picked up the case file from my desk.

"July 13th, 2006," Mike said from memory before I could even get to the right page.

I really must have had my head up my ass lately since I hadn't remembered that date.

I looked up, catching his eye across the desk.

"My birthday," I said with a nod. "Okay, well that should make it easier to remember. Let's see…I was thirty-seven…"

And I suddenly remembered exactly where I'd been on that night.

The good news was that I was nowhere near Jacksonville, NC.

The bad news was that I was pretty sure the man I was with wasn't going to vouch for me.

TBC...


	43. Chapter 43

**Hayes POV**

* * *

><p>"I'll drive. You make the call."<p>

"Lauren…"

"Hayes," I corrected.

"Are you kidding me?"

By this point, we were at the car, and I practically ripped the door from its hinges as I whipped it open to get inside.

I was well aware of the fact that my temper was in overdrive, but it was easier for me to be mad than to let my real emotions come through.

I threw myself into the driver's seat and slammed the door closed and then jammed the key into the ignition.

Bernard moved more slowly and I could almost hear him counting to ten in his head as he sat down and buckled his seat belt.

But I didn't want him to be calm.

I was spoiling for a fight and I was pretty sure I could get him to give me one.

"Which part of_ end it right now_ do you not understand?" I yelled as I backed out of the parking space.

"Oh, I understand the words. I just don't get why you're saying them."

"You don't have to get it. It's my life, my decision. I'm the one who gets to choose how I handle it."

"You're not handling it at all," he countered.

"What?"

"I'm _saying_ pretending that it never happened isn't going to help you."

"What could you possibly know about it? I confess my sad little story to you and suddenly you're the resident expert on rape victims? You want to be the hero and find justice for me? God, I wish I'd never said anything."

"Don't say that."

His voice was quiet, barely audible, causing me to become overly aware of the fact that I'd been shouting.

"Why not?" I asked in frustration, dropping my volume to match his. "I should've just left it alone, and then we'd be fine."

"No, we wouldn't. You broke it off with me, remember? _Before_ you told me. And I don't know why, but you seem to think you're saving me from myself or something. Why can't you understand that nothing you told me changes how I feel about you?"

I didn't want to do this.

I didn't want to have this meaningful conversation where we talked about our feelings.

Instead, I wanted to rail against the injustices of the world and blame them all on Bernard.

I mean, why not?

This was his fault anyway for not just walking away after hearing the details. I couldn't understand why in the world he'd still want to be with me and so it _had_ to be because he felt pity or something.

"This is unprofessional," I said at last. "We're working. We shouldn't be talking about this now."

He sighed heavily and out of the corner of my eye, I could see him shaking his head.

"You're procrastinating," he said knowingly. "It's your defense mechanism."

"Yeah, so?" I retorted childishly, both hating and loving that he knew that about me.

"So stop avoiding the issue."

"What exactly is the issue?" I asked smartly. "That you went behind my back and reopened the investigation? That you seem to want to be some kind of martyr and stay with me even though deep down you know you'll eventually end up resenting me for my shortcomings? Or maybe that you can't possibly look at me without thinking about everything I said to you last night? Knowing everything that was done to me…"

"I don't even know where to begin to respond to that."

"I know," I agreed. "That's what I'm saying. There are too many things wrong with this scenario."

"No!" he yelled. "It's all complete bullshit and you know it! Okay, so maybe I shouldn't have called Olivia, but I didn't _reopen_ the investigation. All I did was ask her to rerun the evidence. It's a simple matter of lab work, and it'll either pop or it won't.

"And as for seeing myself as a martyr," he continued. "Are you serious? When I'm with you, I consider myself the luckiest son of a bitch alive. And your only shortcoming that I can see is your unwillingness to accept the fact that you're _not_ damaged. What happened to you doesn't make you any less desirable to me, and for you to think that I'd be that shallow…I don't know, Lauren."

I opened my mouth, but he wasn't done yet.

"And don't you dare tell me to call you Hayes. I'll do it when we're actually on the job, but when we're alone, you're Lauren, and no amount of distance you try to put in between us by establishing boundaries like that is going to make me change my mind."

He finished his rant, and silence fell over the car. I could hear him breathing heavily, and I desperately wanted to look at him, but I kept my eyes on the road.

We were getting close to New Hyde Park by this point, and I needed to pull myself together before we went into a potentially hostile situation.

"Are you done?" I asked him finally, my voice sounding shaky to my own ears.

"For now," he said firmly. "But we're _going_ to finish this conversation."

"I'm pretty sure that was way too one-sided to qualify as a conversation," I said sarcastically.

"Well, maybe we could have one if you'd quit being so hard-headed," he retorted.

And yeah, maybe I _was_ being hard-headed, but I also believed that I was doing the right thing.

Last night had really messed with my mind.

I mean, I'd told a couple of guys before, guys who I thought had the potential to be serious boyfriends. But those times, I only offered one or two sentences worth of explanation.

I'd never gone through the whole story, not since the night it happened, when I filed the police report.

And even that night, I hadn't cried. Not like I did last night.

It was something about sharing it with someone I cared about…I could just imagine what was going through his mind.

_Why didn't you fight harder, Lauren? How could you let that guy do that to you?_

When I'd agreed to tell Bernard, when we'd gone inside my place, I hadn't been sure how the night would end, but once I finished telling him about it, I just had to be by myself.

He was kind enough to leave, even though I knew he didn't want to, but I couldn't have him stay.

The memories were too vivid, and I was too much of a wreck.

Because as I'd said the words, describing that night, I'd been able to see it in my mind like it was yesterday.

I could feel my attacker's hands on me, and I could smell Wild Turkey on his breath, and I could hear his voice in my head.

And I didn't want to associate Bernard with any of that.

So I'd sent him home.

And at some point during the long, sleepless night, I made up my mind that I really had to let him go. I knew that he was hoping we still had a chance, but I couldn't prolong the inevitable.

I mean, ultimately, we were going to end up apart anyway, so it would be easier to just get it over with.

If I was smart, I would've never started anything with him. But like he'd pointed out a few minutes ago, I had a knack for procrastination, and one big thing I'd managed to put off was dealing with the aftermath of the rape.

It just never occurred to me that it would still hit me so hard, just talking about it.

Because I'd thought that I was over it.

But clearly I wasn't.

I guess burying it isn't the same thing as healing.

"That's it," Bernard said, breaking through my thoughts so that he could point out the potential home of Carl Babbitt.

"I'll keep going and park around the corner," I said blandly.

"Are you okay?"

"Am I okay?" I repeated. "What do you think?"

"I think that maybe I should check out this house alone."

"I can do my job," I replied sharply.

"I know you _can_," he said gently, and I startled when he put his hand lightly on my arm. "But this has the potential to be dangerous. If your head's not in it…well, I just don't want anything to happen to you."

"You mean, anything more than what already did."

And I know…he was being nice and I was being bitchy.

Somewhere between last night and this morning, I'd completely lost control of my emotions.

Maybe he hadn't been so far off the mark when he said that I wasn't handling things.

Maybe I needed to talk to someone.

He kept his hand on my arm, but he didn't respond to my blunt remark, and I finally forced myself to look him in the eye.

"I'm sorry," I said carefully.

"Just for the comment? Or for pushing me away?"

"For being difficult," I answered ambiguously. "I didn't sleep last night, and…"

"I didn't either," he interrupted quietly.

"Couldn't stop thinking about it, huh?"

"I couldn't stop worrying about you," he corrected. "You know, this doesn't have to be so hard."

It was so tempting just to throw myself into his arms, but I didn't.

I couldn't.

"You never called Olivia," I reminded him.

"We've kind of been busy," he answered. "But I'll do it now. If you really want me to."

He held my gaze, and I could practically hear his silent pleas for me to let him do this.

"Forget it," I said as I pulled the keys from the ignition, moving my arm so that his hand was no longer making contact. "She's probably already started it. May as well let it go."

And honestly, I didn't expect anything to pop anyway.

We got out of the car and headed for the building which was listed as the home address for Thomas Croft.

It was listed as an apartment, but now that we were here, it looked more like a duplex. A one-level structure, with each half being a mirror image of the other.

"It didn't list a unit number," Bernard commented as we went up the sidewalk. "How are we supposed to know if it's right or left?"

"I guess we don't."

"If we pick one, and it's the other, he might hear us and run out the back or something."

"We should do them at the same time. You knock on one, and I'll get the other."

He cast me a worried glance, but then gave me a nod.

"What are you expecting?" I asked him.

"Connie said he had a gun, and we know he's desperate. That's not a good combination."

"If this is even our guy," I posed.

"Right."

We approached the front of the structure, and all was quiet.

I knocked on the door of the unit on the left, and Bernard took the other one.

An old woman opened the door in front of me.

"Good morning, I'm Detective Hayes with the NYPD," I said amicably as I showed her my badge. "Does Thomas Croft live here?"

"No, it's just me," she answered.

"Next door?"

"It's a man, but I don't know his name. He moved in a few months ago, but he comes and goes a lot."

I pulled out my phone and brought up the DMV photo of Carl.

"Is this him?"

She gave me a nod and looked at me worriedly.

"Is he in trouble?"

"We just want to talk to him," I told her.

"Well, he's not home right now, but I saw him last night. He was a sight, too. I don't like to spread gossip, but I'd say he got into some kind of bar fight."

I smiled and thanked her and then quickly met up with Bernard, who at this point was circling around the side of the building.

"Neighbor confirmed he lives here," I said, watching as he stood on his toes to try to look through a window.

"Well, he's either not home, or he's playing opossum."

"According to the non-gossipy woman next door, he's not home. She said he came in last night looking like he'd been in a bar fight."

"I like the sound of that," Bernard said with a grin. "So, I'm thinking we need to wait around and see if he comes back."

"A stake out?" I asked, and at the moment, I couldn't think of anything I wanted to do less.

Last week, I would've killed for the chance to get Bernard alone for a few hours, but now the prospect of long, drawn-out conversations was daunting.

"Don't sound so excited, Hayes," he replied, putting the emphasis on his use of my last name.

"It's not that. It's…"

"It's work," he interrupted. "I'll call it in to Lupo and we'll move the car to a good spot so that we can keep the place under surveillance."

He walked away from me, heading for the car, and I suddenly felt the overwhelming urge to burst into tears.

So not like me, and yet lately it was all I seemed to want to do.

Because not only had I stirred up the demons from my past, but I was also making a disaster of my present life as well.

TBC...


	44. Chapter 44

**Bobby POV**

* * *

><p>"The director of the FBI?"<p>

"Well, he was only the assistant director back then."

"And he's married?"

"Uh huh."

"So he won't admit to having been with you."

"I can't imagine why he would. He's still married to the same woman."

We were doing a quick brain-storming session now that Ross had given us carte blanche to work on the Quarles case.

Or rather, he'd given it to _them_.

Which was why we'd decided to do this quick and dirty fact-analyzing conference before Alex and I helped them determine the best course of action.

Because they were _working_ it, but they were both swayed by their emotional involvement, so it had been at Carolyn's request that the four of us were talking about it before they moved forward.

And it was amazing to me how little I actually knew about Carolyn.

She's such a quiet, private person that typically stories of her past came out in tiny little excerpts.

Although, I guess I'm the same way.

I really felt bad for her that this case was putting her personal life in the spotlight.

She'd had enough trouble last fall when she merely had to admit to having an affair with Jack, but now she had daily reminders of that affair, in addition to what was apparently a _second_ affair with a married man.

Of course, I knew she'd previously had commitment issues.

Before Mike, I mean.

That would explain her attraction to unavailable men. It was unlikely they'd ever pressure her for anything more than sex because they'd want to keep their own lives intact.

But it was slightly disconcerting to realize that she hadn't considered the third party involved in these types of situations. Because I couldn't imagine her ever knowingly hurting another woman like that.

The instance with Jack had been an eye-opening mistake for her, or so I'd thought.

But now she was mentioning _another_ mistake.

But it wasn't my place to judge her.

I've certainly done questionable things from time to time.

And right now, she was being strong, opening up and being honest with me and Alex while Mike sat quietly next to her.

I appreciated that he wasn't injecting his thoughts into the discussion.

It was probably hard enough for her to tell the story, so by allowing her to just sit and look at us while retelling it was probably making it slightly easier.

"We need to talk to him," I said gently. "If we can get his corroborating statement, that'll make things a whole lot easier. Do you think he'll remember that night?"

"Are you suggesting that I'm not memorable?" she replied, and I was even more impressed with her, since she was able to make a joke about it.

"It has been five years," Alex reminded her. "Was it only one night?"

"I appreciate that you guys are apparently willing to forgive me for yet another unseemly indiscretion, but when I said that I was with him, I didn't mean sex," she asserted, finally glancing at Mike. "I didn't sleep with him."

"You went on a date?" I asked.

She sighed heavily and looked at the table for a minute. When she once again met my gaze, I was surprised to find that her eyes were glassy with unshed tears.

"You know about my family," she stated. When Alex and I both nodded, she continued. "Their accident happened on the night before my birthday. 2006 was the ten-year anniversary of their deaths. On the 12th, I went out after work and drank myself into oblivion. Suffice it to say, my head was in a really bad place at the time. Anyway, the next morning, the A.D. called me into his office. He said that another agent had reported seeing me out the night before, and I guess there was some concern as to my fitness for duty."

"A colleague ratted you out for getting drunk?"

She shrugged and finished her story.

"Anyway, I insisted that I was fine, and he said that he wanted to take me to dinner that night. He knew it was my birthday, and he knew I was alone. He seemed sincere, and I thought he was a decent guy, so I went."

"Where'd you go?" Alex asked.

"He took me to Le Bernardin."

I relaxed slightly at her admission that she'd gone to dinner with the guy.

Because it _was_ possible that she could've left work that night and flown to Jacksonville in time to kill Cher Quarles, but only just barely. So the fact that she'd gone out somewhere in New York _after_ work meant that it was physically impossible for her to be the killer.

Of course, despite there being details about her life that I didn't know, I _did_ know that it was impossible for her to be the killer anyway.

But we needed facts, not emotions.

"So he was trying to impress you," Alex commented in reference to the swank French restaurant.

"He was putting on the full court press to get me into bed. Twenty minutes after we got to the restaurant, I could tell that he thought he was going to get lucky. You know the type," she said pointedly to Alex.

I hoped that she didn't, but that was just my jealous side talking.

What woman hasn't experienced that kind of smooth-talking slickness from a man who obviously felt entitled?

"At first, I thought he was being sympathetic to my situation," she continued. "But I think he was just hoping that I'd be vulnerable to his advances. You know, easy pickings. I'd gotten drunk the night before…I was obviously depressed and lonely…it wasn't a good time for me."

Mike visibly stiffened, surely thinking about what a schmuck the guy was for trying to take advantage of Carolyn in a situation like that, but she just took a deep breath and smiled at him encouragingly.

"It's fine. I saw him for what he was. Long story short, he got a phone call, and he tried to play it off, but it raised my suspicions. It hadn't occurred to me that he was married, but after that call, I asked him about it, and he said yes, but that his wife didn't expect him to be faithful. Can you believe that? Anyway, I was so ticked that I tossed my drink in his face and left him in the restaurant. So yeah…he'll remember. But he's never going to admit it."

"Okay," I said thoughtfully as I processed her story.

She was right about one thing.

The married director of the FBI wasn't going to cop to being on a date with an agent, especially since said agent had rebuffed his advances and caused a scene in an upscale restaurant.

And it did help explain her loathing of the FBI. It wasn't long after that before she rejoined the NYPD and was assigned to Major Case as Mike's partner.

It was a prime example about how it was hard to regret anything in your life because everything that happened had the potential for changing something else.

If the A.D. hadn't acted like that, maybe she would've stayed with the Bureau.

And then she might never have met Mike.

I forced my thoughts back to the present and how to go about providing an alibi for Carolyn.

What were the odds that a restaurant employee might remember her?

A drink tossed into a guy's face in a place like Le Bernardin had to be a rare occurrence, so it wasn't an impossibility.

The wait staff turnover ratio shouldn't be exceptionally high at that type of establishment either, and it had only been five years.

It was possible that someone there might remember her.

"Start with the restaurant," Alex said.

It was eerie how she must have gone down the exact same path as me.

"Right," I agreed. "We need to take away his ammunition so that we can get our focus down to just the bank account, so for now, let's see if we can prove that you were in the city that night. Did you go anywhere after you left the restaurant?"

"Home. Alone," she said. "Great alibi, huh?"

"We'll find something," I said confidently.

"You mean _we'll_ find something," she corrected. "You two have two new cases."

"We'll work it out. Have you heard anything from Jack today?"

"Not so far."

"Okay," I said again. "I think Cher's case is just a diversion, so let's not spend too much time on it. Go to the restaurant and see if anyone remembers you, but after that, I think you should get started trying to track down that account in the Caymans."

"But what if he initiates that investigation to be reopened?"

"Then all they have is one hair," Alex said firmly.

Once again, she was right _there_, and I couldn't help the feeling of love that rolled through me at that realization.

It was amazing how much she _gets_ me, because we hadn't even talked about this and yet she knew right where I was going.

"The report showed there was quite a struggle and yet all they managed to find of you was a single hair?" Alex continued. "It reeks of set-up."

"Right. And add to that the fact that you would've had to fly straight down there from work, kill her, hide her body somewhere and then fly back to report in to work the next morning…"

"Uh huh," Mike said with a nod. "Because even though there might have been time to commit the murder, you definitely wouldn't have had time to drive across the state and dump the body. And it's not like you could bring it home with you on the plane."

"Exactly," I said. "So let him reopen the investigation. The cops will need more than a hair to bring charges against you."

"Okay," Carolyn agreed carefully. "Okay. So we'll go to the restaurant and ask around, just as a precaution. And then we'll see if we can find my account in the Caymans."

"Yeah, because that's the bigger concern," Alex said. "We don't know where the money came from that's in there, or how it got there, or how much groundwork he's laid to take you down."

"I think we do know that," Carolyn replied. "A _lot_."

"That's fine," Mike said. "He's no match for us. The pictures are obsolete, and my mother's murder case file is defunct, too. So far we've got something for everything he's thrown at us. Let's shut down this Cher Quarles variable and then we can put our focus on his endgame."

So the two of them left with renewed determination.

"Mike's doing great," Alex commented. "Do you think it's an act, or is he really okay with everything?"

"If it's an act, it's a good one. He looked at the pictures, you know. Or one of them anyway."

"He did?" she asked in surprise.

"Uh huh. And he said that he was glad he did."

"I can't imagine why."

"I guess the imagination is often worse than reality," I posed.

Although I wasn't sure I could agree with his decision to look.

I mean, for _him_, it was obviously _his_ choice.

I just wasn't sure if _I_ could do it.

"Quit thinking about it," she said as we sat down at our desks.

"How do you know what I'm thinking about?" I asked.

She rolled her eyes at me, as though the answer was obvious, and then opened up one of our two new case files.

"So what do you really think the chances are of someone at the restaurant remembering her?" Alex asked me quietly.

"It depends. If the director frequented that restaurant, the odds are better."

"Yeah, well I bet he never went back there again after that," she said on a chuckle.

I smiled and nodded my agreement, but she picked up on the fact that something was still bugging me.

"What is it?"

"I…jumped to conclusions about her. She said she was with him, and I automatically had her committing adultery again."

"So did I," she admitted. "But I think it was the natural assumption."

"Maybe. But I should've had more faith in her."

"We know the Carolyn of today. And we know what she's capable of _now_. That doesn't mean we know how she used to be," she admonished lightly. "Just like she doesn't know how we used to be."

We let the topic drop as we each dug into a case.

We'd decided to examine each one and then determine which one should come first. Of course, I was hoping that someone else in the department would clear one of their cases so that we could pass one of these off to them, but I wasn't going to depend on it.

"Okay, this one got kicked to us from the 2-4," Alex said after a minute. "A woman was found dead in a hotel room yesterday morning, and it was assumed that she was a hooker, but apparently the ME was able to identify her as Tiffany Holdren."

"As in, daughter of Walker F. Holdren, III?"

"The one and the same. And the 2-4 wasn't wrong. She'd been picked up twice in the past six months for hooking. The family notification was made this morning."

"Had she been reported missing?"

"Nope. She was estranged from her family, but a call was put into the commissioner, and now it's a Major Case."

"Cause of death?"

"Manual strangulation. What've you got?"

"Construction workers uncovered a body in Red Hook," I told her. "He was ID'd as Father Ryan O'Bannon."

"The missing priest from Chelsea?"

"Uh huh. He was buried in three feet of concrete, and probably never would've been found if the developer hadn't changed his mind about where he wanted the sidewalks."

"That smacks of mob hit, don't you think?"

"And yours sounds like maybe an overenthusiastic john," I mused. "Which one comes first?"

"The media's going to love them both," she replied knowingly.

"The girl's more recently dead. Let's look at her case today, and tomorrow we'll work the priest."

"Tomorrow," she said on a sigh. "What happened to our weekend?"

"Maybe we'll get lucky and we'll catch both killers today. I think you mentioned something to Ross about having both cases cleared by lunch," I teased.

"Yeah, but even we aren't that good."

"Speak for yourself," I said with a smile. "I think I'm pretty damn good."

"Are we still talking about solving crimes here?" she asked, matching my smile. She got up from her chair and handed me the file before reaching for her coat.

"Were we talking about solving crimes?" I replied, hustling around my desk so that I could help her into her coat. I took the opportunity of having justifiable close proximity to speak quietly into her ear. "Because I was talking about something else entirely."

My suggestive comment caused her to turn and look at me challengingly, even though she'd taken a step away to put a more respectable amount of space between us.

"Well, astound me with your genius intuition now and then you can amaze me with your unparalleled prowess later."

I barked out a laugh as I followed her to the elevator.

"Unparalleled prowess? I think I just said pretty damn good."

"You tend to sell yourself short," she informed me.

"Unparalleled," I repeated quietly, enjoying the sound of that descriptive term. "I think I like that."

"I know I like it. So what does your gut say about Tiffany? Is it really just coincidence that her family's loaded, or was that the purpose for the murder?"

"Let's start with the parents and get a read on them. Then we'll swing by the crime scene before making a trip to the morgue."

The elevator doors closed, and so she stepped closer to me, taking advantage of our eleven-floor trip alone.

"See? You've got a plan. You're dazzling me already," she said coyly, running her hand over my cheek.

I could remember how, before we got together, I wished for her to touch me like she was doing now.

Something innocent and chaste, yet intimate.

The action spoke of familiarity and emotion, and in the old days, I'd longed for that kind of connection with her.

And now I had it.

_Finally_.

But even after nine months of feeling her hands on me, it never got old.

The slight caress of her hand on my cheek still sent through me the pleasant feeling of being cherished.

I didn't want her to break contact, but we were almost to the parking garage, so I took her hand from my cheek and instead brought it to my lips, kissing her palm slowly before letting it go.

"Honey, I'm just getting warmed up."

TBC...


	45. Chapter 45

**Jeremy POV**

* * *

><p>"Are you going to tell him what we talk about?"<p>

"Does it matter?"

I considered that for a minute and then realized that my hesitancy to respond was being documented.

I really didn't like this.

But at the same time, I knew it was for my own good.

And did it matter if the shrink shared my revelations with my father? The man who was presently waiting anxiously in the outer office, having blown off yet another day at work just to help me?

No.

Because even if he didn't, I would.

I'd come too far to regress into the immature boy I'd been only a week ago.

When I was younger, I'd often wondered if I'd know the moment I became a man.

And I did.

And it wasn't the first time I had sex, like everyone always thinks it'll be. I was definitely still a boy then, and I probably should've waited a little longer to experiment.

It wasn't the first time I had a drink, either.

There's nothing about beer or liquor that makes a guy more mature. In fact, it's usually the opposite that's true.

No, it was last Friday night.

And I don't know if it was the realization of being in love or being involved in a murder or a combination of the two, but that night was definitely a defining moment in my life.

And I'd fought it.

I'd acted, as Detective Goren put it, like a brat.

I guess somewhere deep down, I thought if I could still act juvenile, then maybe I'd find out that I was just caught up in a bad dream.

That Kelly would still be alive.

But life doesn't work like that.

"No, it doesn't matter," I answered, sitting up a little straighter in the chair.

"Do you keep secrets from your father?"

"I did. But I don't now."

"None at all?"

I wracked my brain, knowing that honesty was crucial to this being a successful session.

"Some, maybe."

"Give me an example."

"If I won't tell him, then why would I tell you?"

"Sometimes it's easier to talk to strangers. You don't have to worry about their expectations."

That was true.

That's why I'd preferred talking to the Gorens.

And yeah, okay, so I still thought that Eames _– Mrs. Goren_ - was hot and I _am_ a guy, so talking with and getting sympathy from a beautiful woman had made the process a little easier.

"That's why you spoke with Detectives Goren and Goren, right?" he continued. "Did it help? Talking things through with them?"

"I don't know. Maybe. They're both good listeners."

"I think that might be what prompted your breakthrough."

"Because I told them what I remembered?"

"It's kind of like unlocking a door. You can't do it until you put the key in the lock, right?"

"I guess."

"And of course, it doesn't hurt that the female Detective Goren is very attractive."

"What?"

"Come on, Jeremy. Don't pretend you didn't notice."

"I don't think the other Detective Goren would appreciate you talking about his wife like that."

"Like what? Complimentary? I just said she's attractive. You don't think so?"

"I didn't say that."

"So you _do_ think so."

"What difference does it make?"

"None," he said casually. "Does she remind you of someone?"

"Eames? I mean…Detective Goren?"

"You know who I mean. Does she remind you of someone?"

"I…no. I don't think so. I just think she's nice, and I like that she's a cop. My mom always hated cops. Well, I mean, she hated that my _dad's_ a cop. She apparently loved every cop except for him."

I paused when I realized how much I'd revealed, and then I became annoyed with myself.

I could tell by the look on his face that he knew it, too.

"I thought I was here so that you could hypnotize me."

"That, and so that we can talk."

I sighed and nodded.

"Okay. Now you know about my parents' sordid marital issues. What's next?"

"Let's talk about Kelly," he said, suddenly changing the subject.

The mention of her name brought about a sick feeling in my stomach.

"What about her?"

"You were in love with her."

"Yeah."

"She was pretty. Your dad showed me her picture."

"Yeah, she was."

"Did you kill her?"

"What? No!" I yelled, getting onto my feet. "What the hell is wrong with you?"

"There's nothing wrong with me," he said calmly. "I had to ask the question, since the cops seem to think that maybe you did it."

"The cops don't know shit," I said firmly, torn between walking out and sitting back down. And then I could hear Liz's voice in my head, admonishing me for my language. "I mean, they don't know crap," I amended. "They think that just because I was there that I'm the one who did it. Detective Goren says that's just lazy investigating."

"Which one?"

"Which one what?"

"Which Detective Goren?"

I looked at him in exasperation and flopped back into the chair.

"Why do you keep bringing her up? Do you have a thing for her or something? Maybe I should tell her husband about it."

"And then what? You think he'd beat me up?"

"No," I replied quickly. "That's crazy."

"Because you don't beat somebody up for emotions, right? I mean, let's say that I do have a thing for her. Then what?"

"Are you trying to figure out if I know about proportionate response?" I asked him.

"We're just talking."

"And you're just making this stuff up to see if I think it would be okay to get violent with Kenny because he was in love with Kelly. The answer is no. I wasn't even going to get violent with him when I thought he killed her."

"Thought?"

"Well, he didn't. He couldn't have."

"But you thought he did."

"I remember him being in that room," I said firmly.

"He gave you the condom."

"No, it was there."

"Who put it there?"

"I don't know."

"Are you sure? Didn't you find it odd that there was a condom just lying on top of your jeans?" he asked, and his quiet mannerism was gone. Now he was practically shouting. "It's not like it was on the floor or the bed. It wasn't just left behind by someone. It was placed deliberately there for your use. Someone who thought it would be funny if maybe Kelly got pregnant, right? Because why else would someone tamper with a condom?"

"You wouldn't."

"Well, somebody did. So who was it, Jeremy?" he asked, raising his voice even more.

My heart was beating faster and I was breathing in quick, short bursts.

I was flooded with visions from that night…Kelly's voice calling out to me…laughter while my face was pushed into the mattress.

"_Jeremy!" _Kelly had shouted. And then, _"Stop, please stop!"_

And Kenny was yelling, _"What are you doing?"_

Kelly was crying, nearly hysterical, _"Jeremy!"_

I fought against the hand holding me in place, knowing that she was being hurt and wanting to help her, but someone was sitting on me, using his weight to hold me down.

"_Do it. You know you want to."_

I shook off the remnants of my waking nightmare, the new dialogue snapping me back to reality.

"Tell me," the shrink said, his voice once again soft in the quiet room.

"She was crying. She was begging for me to help and I couldn't."

"Why not?"

"He was holding me down."

"Kenny?"

"I think so."

"What else?"

"Someone was laughing."

"Kelly?"

"No," I said, nearly choking on my emotion. Hearing her voice in my head, her desperation for me to protect her from what was happening…

"Jeremy?"

"It wasn't Kelly. Like I said, she was crying."

"But it was a woman?"

"Maybe…I don't know. It's all blended together in my head."

"Okay. Take a minute, and then we'll try again."

I sat back in the cushy chair, and it was then that I realized I was sweating.

"How'd you do that?" I asked him.

"Do what?"

"You know what," I said, imitating him with my insistence on straight-forwardness.

"It's a technique I picked up. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't."

"Well, it worked that time."

"Because you _want_ to remember. And you might not be ready to accept it yet, but you were a victim in that attack, too."

"Maybe," I conceded.

"Not maybe. Definitely," he said sincerely. "And you didn't let her down because you were unable to save her. Someone, likely _two_ someones, caught the two of you when you were vulnerable and perpetrated this despicable act. You're not responsible."

Two hours later, Dr. Skoda went over to the door and called my dad into the office.

"We've made some progress," he told him while I sat in the chair, still attempting to recover from the emotionally-charged session.

"Some?" I heard my dad ask, and I glanced up to find him staring at me worriedly.

"He's very receptive," the shrink said.

"And he's right here," I commented as I got up from the chair. "I'm fine, Dad. I got quite a few more flashes of memory, but nothing that tells me for sure who else was involved."

"But it _was_ someone else," Skoda added.

"Are you sure?" Dad questioned, which surprised me because considering what had happened to Kenny, I thought he and I were both in agreement about there being a second person involved.

"Yes," I answered. "Why?"

"I got a call from the Baltimore Police Department. I thought they were going to insist on us coming down, so I started out by telling them that we'd be on our way as soon as you were finished, but the detective interrupted me to say that the case has been closed."

"What? How?"

"It was determined that Kenny committed suicide. And they found a note on his computer, complete with a confession. He admitted to killing Kelly. Alone."

Were my memories wrong?

Was Kelly actually laughing and not crying?

Was it _her_ voice that had taunted Kenny with the challenge _do it – you know you want to?_

No. No way.

But I had too much rattling around in my head to talk about it now.

Skoda had gotten me started on all kinds of things…my mom, my dad, Liz…and then the memories that were resurfacing…it was too much.

I needed to turn it off for a while.

"Jeremy?" my dad questioned.

"I'm fine. I guess Liz is off the hook for making up an alibi then, huh?"

My dad looked guiltily at Skoda, but he just shrugged.

I'd already told him about that anyway.

"_Is that typical of her?"_

"_Lying?"_

"_Yes. Does your stepmother routinely lie?"_

"_No. Never, that I know of."_

"_So how do you feel about the fact that she was willing to lie to protect you?"_ he'd asked me.

"_I don't call her my stepmother_," I said instead of responding to the question.

"_Why not?"_

"_Because the term is indicative of tension or distance."_

"_I thought it was just a clarifying designation."_

"_Who's the evil one in all the fairy tales?"_

"_Good point. So you don't call her your stepmother because you consider it an insult?"_

"_Something like that. I just call her Liz."_

"_And?"_

"_And what?"_

"_There's still a question on the table."_

"_How does it make me feel? Bad."_

"_Why?"_

"_Because…it makes me feel loved. And why should the fact that she lied make me feel loved? I mean, my real mother does it all the time."_

"_Liz lied to someone else to protect you because she loves you. Your real mother lies to you to keep you close and to perpetuate the alienation between you and your father." _

"_I suppose. But I don't want Liz to get into trouble over me."_

"_I'd say that's her choice to make."_

And he was right about that, but still…it was a relief to know that she wasn't going to have charges brought up against her.

"Liz wasn't worried about it," Dad said easily. Then he shook Skoda's hand, and thanked him, so I followed suit.

"We'll meet again on Monday," the shrink suggested.

"Do you think I need it?"

"What do you think?"

"I think I really hate answers that come in the form of questions," I replied, although I smiled at him to take the bite out of it.

He was just doing his job, and maybe a few more sessions would actually help.

We left his office and headed out to the sidewalk.

"So I guess we don't need to go to Baltimore," I commented. "I'll take the subway home and you can get back to work."

"I don't have to," he offered. "No one's expecting me back."

"It's okay. I've got studying to do. We'll meet for dinner tonight, okay?"

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah, Dad. Thanks."

I gave him a hug and then headed south towards the nearest subway station.

I barely registered my surroundings as I made the trip home because my mind was swamped with voices and thoughts and flashbacks.

"_Put it in his hand."_

"_Why?"_

"_Why do you think, dumb ass?"_

"_You're fucked up."_

"_Don't put this on me. You're the one who had to follow her."_

"_To watch her. Not to kill her!"_

"_You wanted to have sex with her. And you did. So what's the problem, Kenny? Would you rather I let her live so that she could accuse you of rape? I'm doing this for you."_

"_You did this for _you_. You couldn't stand her because she had what you wanted!"_

"_Now you're going to act all self-righteous? You just fucked a corpse, you sick piece of shit. So man up and help me get his BVD's on."_

I knew that voice.

I paused on the sidewalk in front of my dad's place, surprised that I'd made it this far.

I stood still, willing myself to remember.

"You're looking a little pale, Jeremy. Are you okay?"

And there it was.

The voice from last Friday night.

Only this time, she was standing behind me on the sidewalk.

The rest of the memories came crashing down on me in a flurry, but I managed to maintain a calm expression as I turned around to face Cierra.

TBC...


	46. Chapter 46

**Lupo POV**

* * *

><p>I let Eames drive again, mostly because I was wound up too tight to worry about traffic.<p>

I'd end up on one of those shows that plays clips of road rage.

I could see the tagline now.

_**Psychopathic cop pulls his gun on unsuspecting commuters in an effort to clear traffic so that he can make it to the Bronx in under thirty minutes. **_

Because even as a passenger, I had to say that drawing my weapon crossed my mind once or twice when we encountered moronic drivers.

So it was better that I sit and ponder.

Was this Larry Grindle our guy?

Would he actually be at home?

Or at least, _this_ home on Gleason Avenue in the Bronx?

I wanted this guy so bad I could taste it.

"You okay, Lupo?" Eames asked me nervously as he maneuvered the car through midtown traffic.

"Yeah."

"Really? Because I'm all for justice and everything, but I'd really rather you didn't go into this guy's house with guns blazing."

"I just want to catch him," I said after counting to ten in my head.

Twice.

"I know you do. And so do I. So let's make sure that we do it right, okay?"

"I hear you," I agreed.

I knew that he was right, but still…

I pulled out my phone and sent Connie a text.

_**Are you staying off your feet?**_

I kept my cell in my hand, knowing that she'd respond quickly, and I spent the moment looking out the window in an effort to slow down my adrenaline.

As expected, my phone buzzed after less than a minute.

_**Is that your way of asking if I've escaped my detail?**_

I couldn't help but smile at her astuteness, and I was suddenly able to breathe a little easier.

I _wanted_ Carl, but Connie was safe. Eames was right. I needed to do this by the book.

_**It's my way of asking if you'll be ready to wear heels with your white dress this weekend.**_

I continued to stare out the window, watching the buildings whiz past.

I had to hand it to Eames. He could drive.

_He probably learned from his sister_, I thought wryly.

I wondered if he and Hayes would bicker about who was going to drive.

Probably.

It was one of those things partners had to work out.

I looked back at my phone as it buzzed again.

_**Maybe we'll go to Mexico and I won't wear shoes at all. **_

"You're not much on conversation, are you?" Eames remarked while I typed in my response.

_**What else won't you wear? Because I can have us on a plane by tonight.**_

"Sorry," I replied to Eames. "I was just checking on Connie."

"I guess she's okay, since you're smiling."

"She's fine."

"Did you tell her that we got a lead?"

"No. I'll let her know after we see if it pans out," I answered. And then because I felt bad for ignoring Eames again, I decided to be more conversational. "She's pretty upset about the ring."

"It was your grandmother's?"

"Yeah. And sentimental value aside, I honestly can't afford to buy a new one. Not right now anyway. Not the kind I want her to have."

Because I'd thought about that already.

I mean, I hated that the ring was lost, but I hated even more that now Connie didn't have one.

I wanted to replace it, but to get something similar was in the neighborhood of five grand.

And I'd held back on law school this semester for a reason.

Well, two reasons actually, but one of them was that times were tight.

Of course, Connie knew that.

She didn't expect anything from me.

Which made me want to do it all that much more.

I also knew she was only teasing about going to Mexico.

Or even Vegas.

Miami we could probably swing if we stayed with Ben, but that wouldn't exactly be a romantic getaway.

It wouldn't be what she deserved.

_Which is why she shouldn't be marrying a cop who mishandled his money for the first decade of adulthood_, my inner voice said for the millionth time since she'd said yes.

But I was getting pretty good at muffling that inner voice.

Connie knew what I had.

Or rather, what I _didn't_ have.

Another text came in and it was like Connie was reading my mind.

_**Nix the plane tickets. I just want you in our bed…and I won't wear anything at all.**_

I couldn't stop from barking out a laugh as I thought about her sitting in her office, possibly across from Cutter, typing me the dirty text.

"What's so funny?" Eames asked me.

"Nothing," I said vaguely.

_**Tonight. It's a date**_, I replied, and then I tucked my phone back into my pocket.

We were getting close to our destination, so it was time for me to get serious again.

Was this going to be Carl's place?

I hadn't heard from Bernard yet, but it would probably take them as long, if not longer, to drive out to New Hyde Park.

Although, I'd noticed that Hayes had worked up a full head of steam by the time they left 1PP, so if she drove anything like her mood might suggest, they probably could've made it to Rhode Island by now.

"It's the next street over," Eames said.

"Park here. I don't want him to see the car and bolt."

"I thought you wanted him to make a run for it," he replied smartly.

"Just shut up and park," I retorted with a smile.

I had to give Eames credit for being able to handle my mood.

I definitely hadn't been much fun to work with this week, but hopefully I'd still taught him a thing or two. He'd go far in the department, that was for sure.

Unless he'd picked up on my tendency to skew the rules a little.

I could just hear Loo now, chastising him for something and having him tell her that he'd learned it from me.

She might not still be my boss, but I had no doubt that she'd pick up the phone and chew my ass out in a heartbeat.

"Okay, so we'll knock and see what we get. If it's him, we'll take him out. If it's anyone else, we'll start showing the picture around and see what we can get."

"And by take him out, you mean arrest him."

"Well...yeah. I mean, I'm not going to shoot him, if that's what you think. Not unless he gives me good reason."

He nodded his agreement and together we went down the sidewalk to the building on Gleason that housed Larry Grindle.

It turned out to be a five story apartment building, with a broken buzzer and disabled lock on the lobby door.

The elevator was also out for the count, so Eames rolled his eyes at me in a move that was much like his sister, and he pulled open the door to the stairwell.

"Lesson number thirty-six," I told him. "Criminals never live on the ground floor."

"Thirty-six? What were the first thirty-five?" he asked with a grin.

I held up a hand and started counting on my fingers.

"Number one – always watch your partner's back. Number two – always bring your partner coffee. Number three –your partner is always right…"

"Seriously?" he said on a laugh. "Always?"

"Hey, you want to learn the ropes or not?"

I joked with him all the way up to the fourth floor, and then we fell silent as I reached for the door that would lead us out of the stairwell.

I pulled it open with my left hand and settled my right onto the butt of my weapon as we entered the hallway.

Our caution could be for nothing, but there was no such thing as being too careful.

Especially since the memory was still fresh in my mind of the stripper who'd pulled a shotgun on me and Bernard a couple of months ago.

Grindle's apartment was the first door on the left. I stood off to one side and Eames stood on the other, and then I nodded at him and he reached out and pounded on the door.

"Mr. Grindle! Con-Ed!" Eames called out.

We were met with silence, so he knocked again.

Still nothing.

And then the door behind us opened up and we both whirled around to find a little boy, maybe eight or nine, standing in the doorway across the hall.

"He's not home."

"You know Mr. Grindle?" I asked.

"Yeah. He left a couple of hours ago."

I looked over at Eames and nodded my head, indicating for him to keep an eye on Grindle's door, and then I stepped closer to the boy and pulled out my cell phone.

"Are you cops?" he asked.

"Uh huh," I answered, tapping my badge where it was clipped to my jacket. Then I brought up the photo of Carl on my phone and held it towards the boy. "Do you know this man?"

"Well, yeah," he said, as though I was stupid for asking. "That's Mr. Grindle."

"Okay, so he's been living across the hall?"

"Yeah, for a few months. But he's not home much."

"But you saw him this morning?"

"He was making a lot of noise, so I opened the door to see what he was doing."

"And what'd you see?"

"He was taking a bunch of stuff into his apartment."

"Stuff. What kind of stuff?"

"I don't know. Like wood and stuff. He dropped a box of nails, and the box broke. I guess that's what I heard. I went out and helped him pick them up. He put everything inside and then he locked his door and went to the stairs."

"So he's a nice guy?"

"Yeah, sure. Why are you looking for him?"

"His car was stolen," Eames spoke up. "We're just following up."

"No way…the 'Vette?"

I glanced back at Eames and raised my eyebrow.

The car registered to Grindle was a Honda. Croft had a Tahoe. Camden had the old Chevy. And Carl had a Lexus.

So who had a Corvette?

"That's right. We think we found it," I told him. "Red, right?"

"Oh," he answered dismissively. "That's not it. Mr. Grindle's is dark blue. He usually parks it in the garage down the street. I can't believe someone stole it. He didn't say anything about it."

"Well, it just happened," I explained. "Hey, why are you home on a school day?"

"Flu," he said casually. "I'm only supposed to be contagious while I have a fever."

Great.

Now that he mentioned it, the boy did look a little flushed. And he'd coughed a few times during our chat.

"Okay, well…feel better," I told him. "Oh, hey, did Mr. Grindle say where he was going? Or when he was coming back?"

"He didn't say," he answered and then he slammed the door and I heard him slide the lock into place.

"So we've got a blue Corvette and possible exposure to the flu," Eames remarked as we headed for the stairwell. "All in all, a productive visit."

"Don't touch your face," I said as I pushed the door open with my backside. "We'll go into the diner next door and you can wash up. The last thing you need is to take the flu bug home to Alicia."

He looked at me like he was surprised by my concern, but he didn't say anything. Instead, he gave me a nod and moved past me into the stairwell.

"You know, there's a guy down on 47th and 5th who'll cut you a good deal on a diamond. I can give you his name."

Now it was my turn to be surprised.

"Uh…yeah, thanks. I don't know when I'll be able to do it, but…"

"Give him a call. You might be able to swing it. He's got a soft spot for boys in blue."

Twenty minutes and copious amounts of diner-grade soap later, we were back in the car.

We'd checked out the parking garage down the street, but there was no blue Corvette to be found.

Eames drove us around the corner so that we'd have a view of the front of the building, and then we settled in for the wait.

"I'm going to check in with Bernard," I said as I pulled out my phone, but before I could dial, it started ringing.

"Good timing," Eames mumbled. "Must be that partner connection."

"Lupo," I answered.

"This place is Carl's, but he's not home, so we're sitting on it," Bernard said efficiently.

"Ditto."

"So they're both him?"

"Looks like."

"I wonder how many more aliases he has."

"At least one more that has a blue Corvette registered to it," I told him. "And he was here this morning with building supplies."

"Neighbor here says he showed up last night."

"So he probably went from Queens to New Hyde Park and then to the Bronx," I deduced. "And now he's at wherever else he goes."

"You think he'll suspect that we found the connection?"

"No. I think he'll come back to at least one of these places. I mean, why bring wood and nails into the apartment if he's just going to ditch it?"

"Good point. I guess we'll stay here for a while and see what it gets us."

"Let's each pull a shift and I'll get a couple of units to replace us for the evening."

"Six hours in the car. Sounds like fun," he said drolly.

"With Hayes," I reminded him, seeing if I could pull anything from him.

Of course, since she was more than likely sitting right next to him, I probably wasn't going to get much.

"Uh huh."

Not much was an overestimate.

"So six hours won't be so bad," I said, trying to be upbeat.

"Okay," he said blandly.

"We need to get together tonight for a beer."

"Me and you and Connie?"

"And Hayes," I pointed out.

Because whatever their issue was, it couldn't be so bad that she didn't want to go out for a drink with us, could it?

I mean, for the past two weeks those two had been all over each other, at least in their minds if not in reality.

And couples argued. It didn't mean anything.

"That's not going to happen," he said carefully.

Okay, so maybe it did mean something.

"We'll work something out. I'll have someone replace you guys at five, okay?"

"Sure thing, Lupes."

I hung up with him and found Eames staring at me.

"What's going on with our partners?" he asked.

"Something, but he's not talking."

"I guess it's none of our business."

"Rule number one, Eames."

"Always watch your partner's back?"

"Uh huh, and it doesn't just apply to the job."

TBC...


	47. Chapter 47

**Mary Shannon POV**

* * *

><p>By noon on Friday, I determined that I had entirely too much stuff.<p>

I'm not sure why I felt the need to box everything I owned rather than taking into account whether each item was something I might one day need.

I mean, I'd packed a waffle iron.

I have no idea where I got it.

I've never used it.

I don't even like waffles.

So why had I boxed it up and had it transported over two thousand miles, just so that it could sit inside a cabinet in my new apartment?

"You're a freaking idiot," I mumbled to myself as I started a new pile in the foyer.

This one was labeled _give away_.

And I planned to be very generous.

I had to be, or there was never going to be room for the new bed that was being delivered in a couple of hours.

The bed that was handcrafted in London.

It was a gift from John, of course, although he claimed that it was just as much for him as it was for me because he planned to spend a lot of time in it.

"_Are you just saying that so I'll accept your ridiculously expensive present?"_ I'd asked him when he showed me the picture of what he'd purchased.

That had been Wednesday night, when we'd gone back to his hotel after our meeting with my new apartment manager.

"_It's a housewarming gift,"_ he'd replied casually.

"_A bed? You buy a plant for a housewarming. A bottle of wine maybe. Not a bed."_

"_Like I said, I hope to get something out of it,"_ he'd answered with that smile of his that sends a tingling feeling all the way down to my toes.

"_Okay,"_ I'd agreed. "_And I love it, so thank you."_

"_You're getting better at this," _he replied.

"_At what?"_

"_Receiving gifts."_

"_Don't get used to it."_

"_No? Because I have something else."_

"_John…"_

"_I went away. It's only right that I bring something back for you."_

"_You go away all the time," _I reminded him.

"_Then you'll eventually get really good at accepting presents. Come on, Mary…"_

And how crazy was it that he was pleading with me about it?

"_You spoil me,"_ I admonished lightly as I took the box from his outstretched hand.

"_You, being with me, is what spoils me. So now we're even."_

I'd opened the box to find a necklace, a gold chain with a diamond pendant. The stone was similar to the ones in the earrings that he'd bought me for Valentine's Day.

"_So I was thinking,"_ he'd said as he plucked the chain from the box and motioned for me to turn around. _"Now you've got the earrings and the necklace. Maybe one of these days we'll get the ring to complete the set."_

My heart had stopped at his insinuation and I barely felt the brush of his fingers against the back of my neck as he clasped the necklace into place.

"_Breathe, Mary,"_ he whispered, wrapping his arms around me from behind_. "I'm not rushing anything. I just want you to know what I'm thinking."_

"_John…"_

"_I love you," _he said. "_And I know that romance and happily ever after really isn't your thing, but I had to tell you because every time I look at you I can't think about anything else."_

"_You think about how much you love me?"_

"_I think about how I never want to be without you."_

We'd let the subject drop at that point, with me chickening out and still not saying the L word, but in my defense, I hadn't seen him in five days and even though I claim to not like romance, his words had done something to me, and so I'd started kissing him and after that, everything was a blur.

But all day Thursday while I began the tedious process of unpacking my life, I kept replaying his words in his mind.

He was really suggesting that he wanted to marry me?

We hadn't been together that long.

He couldn't possibly know all of my faults and annoying habits yet.

But the thing that really stuck out in my mind was this: why didn't it scare the hell out of me?

I'd practically wanted to throw up every time Rafe had even hinted at the word.

I'd assumed it was because marriage just wasn't for me.

I mean, the sum total of my experience with marriage is the five days I spent in nuptial bliss that was nothing about love and everything about sex. I'd been seventeen...still in high school. He'd cheated on me while we were still in the middle of our motel-stay honeymoon, and that had been the end of that, so is it any wonder that I've steadfastly avoided it ever since?

I mean, come on.

Five days.

I've had tooth aches last longer than that.

But the thought of it now didn't seem so bad.

Although maybe it was because John had said it so noncommittally. Not in his commitment to _me_, but in that he hadn't expected a response.

And he wasn't saying _now_.

And he hadn't thrust a ring at me.

But he'd merely let me know that he was going in that direction.

Well, good, because so was I.

Or at least, that's what I'd decided after sitting out on my steps Thursday evening.

I'd needed a break from the mess that was my current abode, so I'd grabbed the beers and headed outside.

And honestly, even though I'd teased Lauren about it, it wasn't a coincidence that I tried to time it for when she might be coming home.

But when I saw the look on her face, it was obvious that something had happened with her and Bernard between Wednesday lunch and Thursday night.

Because that kind of expression didn't come from a bad day at the office.

So I'd offered her a beer and I'd pressured her to talk.

Because she needed it.

And I'm not sure exactly how old she is, but age is all about perspective, so even if I was actually younger than her, I still kind of looked at her like a little sister.

She was certainly in desperate need of some guidance and after spending the day pondering my future, I thought it was time to help someone else out.

After all, I'm so much better with other people's lives than my own.

But she started out by telling me about Connie.

Of course, I knew about the stalker, but I was really surprised by the day's turn of events.

_"She kicked the crap out of the guy, huh?"_ I asked in amusement after she filled me in.

I had trouble picturing Connie in that scenario and yet at the same time, I knew that Lupo had spent a lot of time working with her, and I also knew that she's a lot tougher than she looks.

"_Yes, she did,"_ Lauren agreed, and she sounded almost sad about it.

There was definitely more going on with her.

So I kept at her until she told me that she'd called it quits with Bernard.

And I'm quite experienced at break-ups. In fact, I'm much better at those than at the relationships themselves. Or at least I was. But still…I'm pretty sure that I never once looked quite as devastated as she did.

"_Without more information, my conclusion is that you're an idiot,"_ I finally told her.

"_What?"_

"_I'm serious. He's a great guy, and you two are extremely compatible, and he really likes you and you really like him and you just admitted that the sex is phenomenal, so…I'm not getting it."_

So then she told me about how Bernard had mentioned maybe wanting kids, and about how she can't have them.

I had a feeling that we were just barely scraping the surface of the real issue, but it sounded like something she needed to discuss with him, so that's what I told her.

I even toyed with the idea of stepping inside for a minute so that I could send him a text telling him to get his ass over here, but before I could put my plan into action, he showed up.

I smiled on the inside, glad that my assessment of him was dead-on.

He greeted me cordially, but his gaze kept straying to Lauren, so I made my hasty exit.

I went inside and called John.

"_Are you almost done?"_ I'd asked him.

"_I'm heading your way now. I picked up some take-out."_

"_You really are the perfect man."_

"_Long day unpacking?"_ he said, deflecting my praise. Probably because he thought I was being sarcastic, but for once, I wasn't.

_"That's an understatement. I think I need a Calgon moment."_

So I'd met him out front and together we'd driven back to his hotel.

I was glad to see that Bernard and Lauren were nowhere in sight because his car was still parked across the street, which meant she'd taken him upstairs.

John and I ate Chinese food in his penthouse suite and then I took a long, hot bath to soak my aching muscles.

He'd come in to join me after giving me some time alone.

_"I don't know if I'm going to be ready for Monday,"_ I said as he settled down into the water at the opposite end of the huge sunken tub.

_"Emotionally? Or physically?"_

_"Residentially,"_ I answered.

_"You've got free labor all weekend,"_ he offered. "_We'll get you ready_."

_"And maybe a little emotionally_," I admitted.

My new job was going to be interesting, to say the least, and I was going to need to be at the top of my game.

_"You're just feeling overwhelmed because of the move. And probably because of me. I'm sorry if what I said last night has…"_

"_I love you,"_ I interrupted.

"_Mary, you don't have to…"_

"_Are you kidding me?"_ I asked, cutting off whatever he was going to say. I got up onto my knees, moving over him until I put a hand on either side of his head, holding on to the porcelain edge at his back. _"I've been working up to saying this for two weeks now and you're going to…"_

It was his turn to cut me off.

He grabbed onto my face and kissed me hard.

"_Two weeks?" _

"_Give or take,"_ I replied vaguely before leaning down to kiss him again.

"_Say it again,"_ he said quietly after he broke off the kiss and instead hugged me against him.

"_I love you."_

It was amazing how easily the words escaped.

He sighed contentedly and ran his hands over my back.

"_I wasn't sure I'd ever hear you say it,"_ he admitted.

"_It's one of those flaws you'll learn about. I don't share my emotions very well. Well, except anger. And annoyance."_

"_And cynicism,"_ he added. _"Doubt."_

"_So you _do_ know me well."_

"_I'd like to think so. And what I don't know, I'm anxious to learn."_

"_Anxious?"_ I said on a laugh. _"You're a bit of a masochist, aren't you?"_

"_What do you think?"  
><em>

"_I think you must be to want to be with me."_

"_I think it just makes me smart."_

"_Ha,"_ I scoffed lightly. _"We'll see. But I have to warn you…I'm not ready to get married. Not yet anyway."_

"_I know."_

"_I mean it. I'm just…I don't want to think about that right now."_

"_I meant what I said last night. I'm not in any hurry. When you're ready, you tell me."_

"_What if you've changed your mind by then?"_

"_That's not going to happen."_

That was last night.

This morning, he'd dropped me off at my apartment so that I could make more progress with the unpacking.

And now that it was noon and I'd revamped my approach, I was finally starting to get somewhere.

_I should've done this on the other end_, I thought as I added yet another box to the giveaway pile.

My phone buzzed to indicate an incoming text so I waded through the mess to get to the kitchen table.

It was from Carolyn, whom I'd barely seen since I'd gotten back to town.

_**Debriefing tonight at Steve-O's around six. Are you in?**_

Debriefing.

That meant there would be at least a dozen of us, eating and drinking and talking over each other.

Yeah, debriefings were definitely on my _pros_ list.

_**Absolutely, **_I replied.

I was anxious to hear about their current cases.

While I was in this transition stage, I'd kind of been feeling like I was out of the loop. And really, I _was_ since until two days ago, I'd been living halfway across the country.

But now that I was going to be here full time, I wanted to establish the fact that I was interested in their lives.

Carolyn had been having trouble with Jack, and Ross' son was involved in a murder investigation. I had a bet with John on whether or not Alex was still using her sling. And I wanted to see how Connie was holding up after her ordeal, not to mention that I needed an update on Lauren and Bernard…

Hell, we might have to pull an all-nighter.

TBC...


	48. Chapter 48

**Bernard POV**

* * *

><p>"You said your parents have never visited you in New York."<p>

"That's right."

"Not even after…"

"Bernard…"

Lauren finally shifted her gaze to mine briefly before returning it to our target, and I almost felt bad about my questions.

Almost.

But we'd been sitting in the car for nearly an hour and neither of us had spoken a word and that whole time, I just couldn't stop thinking about…everything.

"We've got five hours to go," I said reasonably. "Do you really want to spend the entire time in silence?"

"No," she admitted. "But does that mean we have to talk about _that_?"

She had a point.

It probably wasn't fair of me to push the conversation on her, considering she was stuck in the car with me.

If I was going to try to talk about it with her, I should wait until we were in a situation where she was free to leave.

Otherwise it was almost like I was holding her hostage.

"Fair enough."

But then we both fell quiet again.

Because really, when there was something so huge looming between us, how could we possibly make small talk?

Our phones buzzed at almost the exact same time.

"A text from Carolyn," she commented, and I saw that mine was from her, too.

_**Debriefing tonight at Steve-O's around six. Are you in?**_

I snorted out an attempt at a laugh as Lauren read her message aloud and it was exactly the same.

_I guess Carolyn's playing Dr. Phil today_, I thought.

No doubt at Lupo's urging.

I typed my affirmative reply, and I noticed that Lauren replied, too, but she didn't comment on whether her answer was yes or no.

Instead, she sighed heavily and shifted in her seat, pulling one leg up beneath her so that she was halfway facing me, but she kept her focus on Croft's front door.

"I didn't tell them," she said in response to my previous question.

"You didn't…how could you not tell them?" I asked in surprise.

"Because I knew how they'd react. _I knew New York was a huge mistake. You need to move back here and finish law school._ And honestly, I just didn't want to hear it."

"They might have surprised you."

"No. They never have before so I couldn't imagine how things would've been any different. My mom probably would've asked what I was wearing and my dad would've wanted to know if I'd led the guy on…"

"Lauren…"

"It's okay," she interrupted. "That's just how they are. And we don't talk that often anyway, so it's not like they ever suspected anything."

I wasn't sure what to say to that, and I hurt for her _again_.

"It's funny, she continued. "I mean, not ha ha funny, but…my mom thinks the reason I'm still single is because I'm a cop. She says that if I'd ever take a moment to learn how to be a _lady_, then I could catch me a man and start a family."

She shook her head and once again brought her eyes to mine.

"I told her that my job has nothing to do with it, but she says that no man in his right mind would want to be involved with a cop."

I let out a humorless laugh and said, "We need to tell Mike and Bobby that. I'm guessing they might disagree."

"Yeah, well, I'm no Alex. Or Carolyn either," she replied sadly.

"I wouldn't want you to be. I like you just like you are."

She gave me a dubious smile and said, "Anyway, so it works out that my mother hates my profession, because then she doesn't have to know the real reason why I'm never going to give her grandchildren."

I wanted to throw professionalism to the wind and pull her into my arms, but before I made any kind of move, my phone rang, shattering the moment.

"It's…um…Olivia Benson," I said when I looked at the display. "Should I…"

"Answer it," she said firmly.

But she sat up straighter in the seat and neither of us was really paying much attention to Croft's house so I hoped like hell that he wasn't going to come home in the next ten minutes.

"Bernard," I answered.

"I found him."

"What?" I practically shouted.

"What is it?" Lauren asked.

"She got a hit," I told her at the same time that Olivia said, "And get this. He's doing twenty-five to life in Frackville."

"For what?" I asked cautiously as a lead ball settled in my stomach.

I mean, I was glad to know that the guy wasn't walking around a free man, but…

"Rape and murder. It happened only a month after…the one you had me run," she replied, clearly avoiding the use of Lauren's name. "But ten years ago, Pennsylvania wasn't on VICAP, so even though they entered his information, it was only in their in-state database, so it didn't pick up the hit from New York."

"What?" Lauren asked, watching my face intently.

"Can you send it to me?" I said to Olivia.

"The information on his conviction?"

"Yeah. And thank you."

"Sure, I'll get it to you as soon as we hang up. And let me know if you want me to do something more. I mean, I know he's already in prison, but another conviction might help keep him there."

"I'll let you know."

I hung up and told Lauren what I'd learned.

She didn't visibly respond, but instead looked like she was in shock.

I could understand that. I felt a little bit of it myself.

"I guess I should be grateful that he didn't kill me, too, huh?" she said at last.

"It's because you did everything right," I asserted. "You did what you had to do to stay alive."

"You know, I spent two days in the hospital," she said quietly. "My boyfriend at the time…he blamed me. I mean, he didn't say it, but I could tell. He broke up with me before I even got my discharge papers."

"Then he didn't deserve you in the first place."

I watched her profile as she stared through the windshield. She smiled briefly at my remark, but then she shook her head and looked at me.

"How can you be so unwavering?"

"In my feelings for you?"

"In your acceptance of me."

"You accepted the fact that I have a son I've never seen, which was a conscious decision on my part. Why wouldn't I be able to accept what happened to you, something that was in no way your fault?"

I thought maybe I was getting through to her since she continued to stare at me.

We were both being grossly negligent in our duties, but I couldn't help it. This was too important. I glanced at Croft's place often enough to feel fairly confident that he wasn't around, and the neighborhood was quiet, so surely we'd hear an approaching car.

"I'm sorry if I hurt you," she told me, her voice nearly a whisper. "I didn't realize…I thought I was over it. And I wanted to tell you so that you'd understand why we can't be together, because I don't want you to think that it's you. But telling you brought everything rushing back, and now I can't seem to bury it again. It's always right there in the back of my mind, and it has to be in yours, too. It has to make you see me differently, and honestly, I liked it a whole lot better when you thought I was this beautiful, innocent, upbeat person, but…"

"Don't use past tense," I interrupted.

"But it _is_ past tense. It _has_ to be because now you know, and you've read the file, and that's what you'll be thinking about if we ever tried to…if we were to…you know."

"You think it'll be on my mind the next time I make love to you?" I asked, intentionally using decisive words to let her know that I really hoped there _would_ be a next time. "Because I can promise you…when I'm with you, I have enough trouble remembering my own name."

She smiled and ducked her head, and I hoped that maybe I'd put the image in her mind of the last time we were together.

I looked across the street again and then broke protocol even more by reaching out to pick up her hand.

"I don't know how many ways I can tell you that none of your past matters to me."

"But it _will_," she insisted. "At some point…"

"No."

"You can't know that. And look how hard this is now. How much harder will it be six months down the road? Or in a year when you decide you're ready to have kids?"

"Lauren…"

"I just…I need to work on this myself," she said, gently removing her hand from mine. "I've opened up doors that I don't know how to close, and I'm dragging you down with me."

"I _want_ to be with you," I promised, but then I forced myself to back off. Maybe she needed some time to deal with things without the added pressure of being in a relationship. "But if you need some time, then I'll wait."

"For me?" she asked, seemingly surprised by my concession. "I can't ask you to do that."

"You didn't. And at the very least, I'm still your friend, okay? Don't think this changes that."

She nodded thoughtfully.

"So if I decide to take a drive to Frackville…"

"I'll go with you," I finished quickly, because just the thought of her going to confront her attacker, alone…I didn't care if the guy was in prison, I wasn't going to let her do that.

Although _I'd_ like to confront him alone.

Or maybe I'd have a meeting with his cellmate, maybe take a few cartons of cigarettes as incentive for a little jailhouse justice…

"Hey, B.," she said suddenly, and just like that, we seemed back on track. As friends at least. Because I wasn't Bernard anymore, and as she said my name, she tapped against my chest with the back of her hand and then she pointed through the windshield.

"Hello, Mr. Croft," I mumbled as I watched a dark blue Corvette park along the curb in front of the duplex.

"Let's let him get up to his door," I continued. "It'll limit his options as to where he can go."

Because I didn't want to get into a high speed chase with a Corvette.

"Uh huh," Lauren agreed as we both stared intently at the driver. He was dressed in jeans and a black hoodie and a Mets baseball cap, and when he got out of the car, he went around to open the trunk.

"What do you think he's doing with all the building material?" I posed as we watched the guy pull several rolls of insulation from the trunk.

"I'm wondering how he got all of that stuff crammed into the trunk of a 'Vette. And why even buy a Corvette? It's not exactly a low-profile vehicle."

"Very good question," I replied as my adrenaline began to build.

I wanted this guy.

I was glad that he'd come here instead of back to his place in the Bronx, because I wasn't sure if Eames would be able to rein Lupo in.

Not that I blamed Lupo.

Maybe once upon a time, I wouldn't have been able to understand it, but now I could.

But still…he was my partner, and maybe this time he needed me to protect him from himself.

If he let loose on Carl, there could be serious repercussions.

So maybe _I'd_ let loose on Carl.

"What do you think?" Lauren asked me expectantly as the guy headed up the sidewalk with his insulation in tow.

"Yeah, let's do it."

We silently got out of the car and made our way across the street, now directly behind the suspect.

At the last second, he dropped one of the rolls of insulation and it bounced backwards on the sidewalk, so he turned around to get it.

"NYPD! Stop right there!" I called out, since now we were made.

It only took a split second for him to toss the remaining rolls of insulation in our direction and take off running across the front yard.

There's a reason why I hate foot races.

I mean, I'm a big guy. And I'm quick for someone of my size, but still…I'm not built for running.

That said, I still kicked it into high gear and followed after him.

Lauren was beside me for a moment, and then she left me in the dust as she quickly closed the gap on our suspect.

The chase only lasted across five front yards before she brought him down, tackling him at the waist, and their momentum carried them onto the pavement of a side street.

"Carl Babbitt, you're under arrest!" she said roughly as she wrestled him into a subdued position.

"Wait!" he yelled back as he scrambled to get out from beneath her.

She almost had him under control just as I caught up to them.

"Lay still!" I ordered, and I don't know if it was my command or the sound of me pulling back the slide of my weapon, but whichever the case, he stilled instantly.

She slapped on the cuffs and then got to her feet, pulling him up with her.

"You okay?" I asked her, taking a second to assess the situation since we had our suspect under control.

"Yeah," she answered dismissively. And then she spun Carl around so that he was facing us.

And that's when we realized our mistake.

"You're not Carl," I said in confusion.

"No shit! That's why I said _wait_," the guy fired back.

"But you ran," Lauren reminded him.

"And what are you doing in Carl's car?"

"I don't know who Carl is," he said. "The 'Vette belongs to my buddy Steve. He loaned it to me on the promise that I'd pick up some stuff for him and drop it off at his friend's house."

"But you ran," Lauren said again.

"Hey, I owe some back child support, okay? I thought the bitch ex had sicced the cops on me."

"Maybe you should keep up with your responsibilities and then you wouldn't have to worry about it," I said in disgust. "Now tell us what you know about your buddy Steve."

TBC...


	49. Chapter 49

**Alex POV**

* * *

><p>"You know, when you said that, I thought you were kidding."<p>

"I was."

"And yet you still managed to close two cases in one day."

"Well…yeah, but not by lunch time."

"It's only four-thirty," Ross said. "Not bad. You barely had enough time to drive to the crime scenes, much less narrow down your suspect field."

I smirked at Ross, and then turned to smile fully at Bobby.

We were standing in Ross' office, having come up to check in with him after arresting the killer of Father O'Bannon.

And we'd found _him_ after we'd deduced that Tiffany Holdren's pimp had been the one who strangled her in the motel room.

Apparently the heiress hooker had been holding out on her pimp's fifty-percent cut, and for some reason, he'd decided to make an example out of her.

Of course, the forty-eight year old small-time player had been shocked to learn that Tiffany came from a wealthy family. Undoubtedly, if he'd known that, he would've kept her alive and attempted blackmail instead.

But he hadn't known, and so the whole thing had played out like some cheesy movie of the week.

He'd strangled her and then bragged about it to his other girls so that they'd know better than to cross him.

Hopefully now that the pimp was heading to jail, his girls would take the opportunity to find new careers.

But I'd worked Vice long enough to know that probably wouldn't happen. More than likely, the girls had all already found new pimps.

The priest case had taken us even less time to unravel.

The detectives working his original disappearance had a witness statement that Father O'Bannon had taken confession from a woman named Lily Obolowski. Those detectives had never followed up with Lily, although in their defense, they didn't know that the priest was going to turn up buried in concrete with two gunshots in the forehead.

The hit had mob written all over it, so we reread the file with that fact in mind, and when we came across Lily's name, Bobby connected her to the Russian mob.

Sure enough, her uncle was a made man.

We spoke with Lily, who apparently was torn about her recent activities, and she admitted to us that she'd confessed a myriad of sins she'd committed at the behest of her uncle, and then she felt guilty about the _confession_, and so she told her uncle what she'd done.

Two days later, the priest had mysteriously disappeared, but now the mystery was solved.

We picked up Olaf Obolowski and after he threatened us in three different languages, he finally slipped up and made mention of the specific location where the body had been recovered, a fact that hadn't been released to the media.

"Sometimes the hunches play out," Bobby said nonchalantly to Ross. "It could've just as easily gone the other way."

"I'm starting to think that's not true. You two keep that up, and the rest of the department is going to start resenting you for setting the bar so high."

"We'll risk it," I said dismissively. "So how did it go at Skoda's?"

"Really well, I think. And the whole thing in Baltimore is apparently over. Kenny Cossman's death has been ruled a suicide, and he left a note on his computer, confessing to killing Kelly."

I looked at Bobby, curious to see his response to this news because my first reaction was cover-up.

By whom, I wasn't sure, but I didn't peg Kenny as the type to pull off Kelly's murder by himself.

Jeremy felt pretty sure that there were two people in the room with them. Not only that, but while a murder-suicide wasn't all that unusual, it _was_ odd that Kenny had waited nearly a week to kill himself.

Most of the time, it happened within the first couple of hours after the murder.

And a confessional suicide note?

"How sure are they?" I asked, still reading Bobby's face.

He was with me. His brow was furrowed slightly and I could almost see the wheels turning in his brain as he considered the facts.

"Their ME signed off on the suicide. It was an overdose of ketamine."

"The one drug we couldn't get anyone to admit to dealing," I remarked.

"It's pretty hard to OD on ketamine," Bobby said, still holding my gaze.

"Uh huh," I said with a nod. "That's because it's hard to pop more pills when you're passed out cold."

"Surely the ME knows that, Chief. What did he say?"

"I haven't seen the report. I'm just going by what the detective told me. Isn't it possible that he took a large quantity all at once?"

"Yeah, but a lethal dose…that's at least four and a half grams. That's a _lot_. And it's a lot more than most people would think they'd need to take."

"And not exactly the drug of choice for suicide," I added.

"So you think his accomplice killed him and left him holding the bag," Ross stated.

"It bears looking in to."

"It's not our jurisdiction, and I'm not sure how receptive the BPD will be to me sticking my nose in it."

"But…"

"And not only that," he interrupted. "But if I insist that they reopen the case, then that puts Jeremy back in the hot seat."

"And if you don't, the real killer might walk," Bobby reminded him.

"I know," he agreed, letting out a heavy sigh. "If someone else is involved, we need to find him. I'll give them a call and get some more information."

"We can make a trip down there this weekend, if you want," I offered.

I didn't really want to give up our weekend, but if our help was needed on the case, I would.

"I appreciate that. I'll let you know."

He picked up his phone and we turned to leave.

"I hear there's a debriefing tonight," he called out as I opened the door.

"Six o'clock. Are you coming?"

"Liz and I are going to meet up with Jeremy for dinner. We'll catch the next one."

So we left Ross' office and went down to the squad room, just in time to catch the tail end of a bickering session between Bernard and Hayes.

They were standing in the hall just outside of one of the interrogation rooms, and as soon as they saw us, they both immediately went quiet, but I'd heard the last two sentences spoken before we'd come into view.

"_What are you going to do, just bury your head in the sand and hope that it doesn't happen?"_

That was Bernard.

"_I'm going to do what feels right to me and I really don't need you or anyone else telling me what that should be."_

And that was Hayes.

And I'm pretty sure she'd been about to say more, but like I said…they both clammed up when they saw us.

"I heard you brought in a guy driving one of Carl's cars," I said.

"Uh huh," Bernard answered. "Will Kittredge, deadbeat dad and all-around low-life. He lawyered up after the first five minutes, and now he won't say anything at all."

"What about Lupo?"

"There's supposed to be a unit going out to relieve him and Eames in a few minutes. We put a black and white on the place in New Hyde Park, too. Kittredge was delivering rolls of insulation, so he's up to something. And Carl dumped lumber and nails off at his apartment in the Bronx."

"He's building more holding cells," I suggested. "One at each place, in case he's discovered. He thinks he can snag Connie again."

"Maybe," Hayes agreed, and she finally looked at me for the first time since we'd bumped into them.

She was a mess.

I mean, on the surface she looked normal, but I could tell that she was barely holding it together.

My curiosity was up as to the nature of their argument, especially since I'd advised her to come clean with Bernard on her secret from the past.

It made me uneasy that now they were fighting about it, after I'd encouraged her to open up.

"So what've you got from the car?"

"It's registered to a guy named Stephen DeBeers of Washington Heights."

"Wait, let me guess. He's a resident of Rikers."

"Close. Attica. We checked out the place, but it's empty and the neighbors swear they haven't seen him in weeks."

"So what vehicles are still out there?"

"The Tahoe belonging to Croft, the Chevy that's Camden's, and the Honda in Grindle's name. We've got APB's out on all of them. The Lexus and the Corvette are at the impound."

"Five cars…five apartments…where's this guy getting his money?"

"He's maxing out the credit cards from his stolen identities."

"Well, it wasn't very smart of him to use inmates from so many different prisons," I remarked. "Odds are good that once we catch him, he'll be incarcerated with one of the guys he screwed over. So what's next?"

"We're just hoping for hits," Bernard admitted. "The BOLO, the APB's…something. We're going to spend the next hour going through more prison records, but other than that, I'm not sure what to do."

I glanced at Bobby and then tipped my head towards the squad room.

"Okay," I told Bernard and Hayes. "We're going to catch up with Mike and Carolyn and see where they are on their case. We'll see you guys tonight, right?"

"Yeah," Bernard said, but Hayes looked reluctant to respond.

"I'm not sure," she said at last. "It's…um…been a long day."

I watched them as Bernard stared hard at her and she purposely avoided his gaze.

"Just for a little while," I encouraged.

She finally relented, agreeing to come by for one drink, so Bobby and I left them in the hall and went to find the Logans.

"Do you have any idea how hard it is to track a numbered account in the Caymans when I don't even have the number?" Carolyn posed in irritation as we approached her desk.

"Try impossible," Mike answered for us. He sat back in his chair and ran a hand through his hair. "We've been at this for hours, but without knowing which bank, or the exact balance, or the account number…we're chasing our damn tails."

"Did you have any luck at the restaurant?"

"That was the one bright spot to our day," Carolyn answered. "The current manager used to be the assistant manager and he worked nights. I found Edmonds' picture on the FBI website and I showed it to him, asking if he remembered him."

"The guy was sharp, too," Mike added with a grin. "He stared at the picture for a minute and then started nodding his head, and when he looked up at us to tell us what he remembered, you could see the light bulb click on. He remembered Edmonds _and_ Carolyn. He remembered the whole damn incident. And you wanna know why he recalled something from five years ago?"

"Edmonds paid him," Carolyn said without preamble. "Somebody in the restaurant snapped a picture of him while he sat there with a Cosmo all over his face, so he paid a bribe in order to have the camera confiscated."

"Nice guy, the director," I mused.

"Exactly. The manager pocketed the Benjamin and then quietly comped the other gentleman's meal in exchange for his camera, which was then handed off to Edmonds."

"And he was willing to go on the record?"

"Uh huh. He gave his sworn statement, so I have it if anything comes of the murder investigation."

"But there's no way he remembered the exact date."

"Actually he did, because it was his last night as assistant manager. The next day, July 14th, his promotion went into effect and he switched to the dayshift."

"It doesn't get any better than that," I commented. "Now we're three for four, so all we have to do is uncover this banking mess."

"Yeah. Easier said than done," Mike said. "We could do this every day for a year and not find anything."

"So maybe we need to come at it from a different angle," I said. "You rallied the troops at Steve-O's, right?"

"Yeah, at Lupo's request."

"Well, maybe we need to invite a couple more," I said as I pulled out my phone. "I think I know a way to find that bank account."

TBC...


	50. Chapter 50

**Bobby POV**

* * *

><p>"Wait, let me guess. You want us to go up to the bar to get our drinks."<p>

Alex followed up her snarky comment with a lovely fake smile as she stared at Mike and waited for his response.

The four of us were the first to arrive at Steve-O's and we'd just pulled four tables together along the back wall.

I wasn't sure if that'd be enough room for everyone, especially since Lupo had mentioned that Sean and Alicia were coming, and Alex had invited Cutter, who was still on Mulder-duty.

"You know what I like," Mike teased her suggestively.

"Uh huh. Carolyn told me what you like, and I've got to say, it's a little disturbing."

I laughed as I sat down in one of the many chairs gathered around the table.

"Are you telling stories on me again, sweetheart?"

"Only the good ones," Carolyn assured him. "Come on, Alex. Let's leave them alone so they can talk about us."

"You think we don't have anything better to talk about?" Mike called out after them. Carolyn flashed him a smile over her shoulder, but didn't respond.

Mike sat back in his chair, resting one ankle on the opposite thigh, and said, "So, how are things with you and Alex?"

It was impossible not to smile when he was in this kind of infectious mood.

"Good," I answered. "Great."

"I didn't mess you up too bad, talking about the pictures the other night, did I?"

"A little, but you knew it would."

"Yeah…I'm sorry about that."

"Don't be. You were gauging your reaction against mine. And the night turned out okay."

"Just okay?" he asked with a wide grin. "Or did it turn out like mine?"

We laughed together for a minute and then both of us shifted our focus to our wives.

Carolyn tilted her head towards Alex's, saying something that caused Alex to smile.

I watched her as she tucked a piece of hair back behind her ear, and then, as though she could feel my eyes on her, she glanced over at me and the look on her face went straight to my groin.

"Do you ever take a step back and wonder how in the hell you got here?" Mike asked me quietly.

"Every single day," I mumbled, already thinking about getting Alex home.

Of course, there were a lot of people on their way here, so it would be several more hours before I could get her alone, but that was okay.

It might be fun to spend some time building the anticipation.

Maybe tease her a little.

"I know we were supposed to get together, just the four of us, but since it's not working out that way…well, I'm going to take advantage of the few minutes we have before the others show up."

"Okay," I said carefully, caught off guard by his suddenly serious mood.

"I didn't ever really thank you for taking the time to read over my mother's file," Mike said.

"Yes, you did," I countered. "And you didn't have to anyway."

"I'm sure it didn't make for very good bedtime reading."

"Yeah, well I'm pretty sure that reading it was nothing compared to living it."

He nodded thoughtfully, but held my gaze, like he was once again trying to gauge my response.

"Carolyn said that it wouldn't change how the two of you look at me."

"You needed her to tell you that?"

"I tend to have a low opinion of myself, so I'm more inclined to trust her in situations like this."

"Trust her…trust me…trust Alex…we're all going to tell you the same thing. And you could tell me another hundred stories…and I honestly believe that you have that many to tell…but it's never going to make me think less of you, so quit thinking that it's even a possibility," I said firmly.

"Are you playing the hard ass with me, Bobby?" he asked me with a smile.

"It seemed appropriate," I replied with a shrug.

"I think you're channeling Alex," he asserted, and then we both looked back towards the bar.

It seemed like the women were taking their time, presumably to allow us to talk privately for awhile. Business was still slow for the time being, although I knew it would pick up soon, but for now, the bartender apparently had time to flirt.

"How's Carolyn doing?" I asked him, still watching Alex.

"We're over the hump. She blew my mind with that director thing."

"I feel kind of bad about that," I admitted.

"Because you assumed she slept with him? Don't feel bad. When she first said it, I thought the same thing. She knows that the way she said it, our assumption was the natural one to make."

"Still…"

"We're good, Bobby," he interrupted. "The four of us have been through too much together to worry about walking on eggshells."

"Okay," I said with a nod.

He had a point.

"So seriously…objectively…what did you think about that file?"

"I think that you must have a lot of your father's blood in you, considering how well you turned out."

"I don't know about that… I mean, he left. Although, you know, with the way she was, who's to say if the man who lived with us when I was little was truly my father."

Again, more parallels between Mike and me.

"You think that's a possibility?"

"It's crossed my mind. More than once. But I don't know…I guess I never really seriously considered it."

"What color were your dad's eyes?" I asked him.

He'd just moved his gaze back to Carolyn, but at my question, he quickly turned back to me.

"Why?"

"There were several references to the fact that yours are exactly like your father's, and you have to know that yours are fairly unusual."

"So…what? You think maybe he really _wasn't_ my dad?"

"I'm just asking the question. I mean, we know she married the man who raised John after she was already pregnant. It's possible she repeated the pattern."

"Huh," he said thoughtfully, furrowing his brow as he deliberated my suggestion.

"Or not," I posed.

"No, I'm just trying to remember. I think they were brown. I've got a few pictures somewhere. I'll have to look."

But he and I both knew that the fact that he couldn't remember most likely suggested that they _weren't_ like his. Most kids recognize when they have a feature identical to a parent.

And Mike had been fourteen when his dad left, which was plenty old enough to take notice of something like that.

And like I said, the color of Mike's eyes was different than any I'd ever seen.

"You know, I know I'm the one who tossed that idea out there, but...huh. I mean, obviously I knew that she was the type of woman to make it plausible…"

"I didn't mean to upset you."

"I'm not upset. I mean, I loved my dad, but he was a coward and a loser, and it sure would be nice to think that maybe I've got some decent blood running through my veins."

"Well, I know that _I've_ got some," I told him.

He caught my meaning, and gave me a grin.

"Yeah, I think you owe me a pint or two, don't you?"

"It's ready whenever you need it," I replied. "But don't need it, okay?"

Our conversation halted when Lupo and Connie came into the restaurant and made their way back to our table.

Alex and Carolyn were still up at the bar, now sipping on their drinks while still chatting up the bartender. I guess Alex figured that I'd talk to Mike about his mom's file, so she was giving us plenty of time.

"The womenfolk are at the bar," Mike told Connie, nodding his head in the direction of our wives. "Be a good girl and go fetch Lupo a drink."

"If I thought for one second that you were serious…" Connie began, but Mike stood up and pulled her into a hug, cutting off her innocuous threat.

"I know. You'd kick my ass. I hear you're pretty good at that."

"I had a good teacher."

"So you're still feeling okay?" I asked her. Mike sat back down and Lupo took the chair next to him, but Connie remained standing and took a step or two in the direction of the bar.

"I'm good," she answered. Then she smiled and ran her hand over Lupo's head. "Even though Lupo won't elope with me."

"I didn't say that," he argued lightly.

"Elope?" Mike asked. "You can't do that. You have to do it up right. In August."

"You like to toss orders around, don't you? I'm going to have to talk to Carolyn about that."

She moved away from the table and I watched as she went to stand next to Alex at the bar.

"So…why are they up there and we're over here?" Lupo asked.

"Uh uh. You first. Why does she want to elope and why did you say no?"

"The prick Carl," he said, shaking his head. "I guess he really got to her with all of his derogatory comments about me, and about how we didn't belong together. She's got the sudden urge to make it official. And public."

"Well, if that's the thing she's focusing on..." I said reasonably.

"I know," Lupo agreed.

"Did you get the whole story from her? I mean, he didn't…"

"He kissed her," Lupo said between gritted teeth. "But that's it. It was mostly just talk. I guess he was saving the action for when he got her into that room."

"How close are you to finding him?"

"We've got units on all of the houses we know about, including the one in Washington Heights that Bernard and Hayes learned about today. I'm going to see if Mulder can write a program for us to use, something that'll extrapolate the pertinent information instead of wasting man hours wading through it."

"Yeah, well, get in line," Mike said.. "Alex had the brilliant idea of asking him to track down Carolyn's bank account in the Caymans."

At Lupo's confused look, Mike and I filled him in on the latest with Jack Quarles, and we finished up just as the ladies finally came back to the table.

"Back so soon?" Mike teased, wrapping his arm around Carolyn as soon as she sat down.

"We can go back to the bar," Alex said as she walked around the table. "I'm pretty sure I was one smile away from getting the bartender's phone number."

"Then I'd say you were already gone too long," I told her.

She sat down beside me and I immediately settled my hand on her leg, sliding it towards the inside of her thigh in an extremely intimate manner that exhibited ownership.

She glanced up at me and smiled and once again, the action sent arousal through me at an amazing rate.

I leaned over and whispered into her ear, "And if you stay here, that smile will get you a whole lot more than a phone number."

I let my lips linger in the vicinity of her ear for longer than was necessary, knowing how much she likes when I do that, and I wasn't disappointed by her response.

She shifted closer to me, moving my hand even higher on her thigh, and then she turned to kiss me.

"Hey, guys, cut it out," Mike teased.

"Yes, please!" came another voice. I reluctantly ended the kiss and saw that Sean and Alicia had joined us. "The last thing I need to see is my sister kissing some guy…"

"My husband," Alex reminded him. "And it never bothered you to watch back when we were in high school."

"That's because I needed something to tease you about."

"You were just jealous that she was getting action and you weren't," Alicia joked.

"Let's _not_ talk about what kind of action Alex was getting," I said, although it didn't bother me in the least. She'd mentioned before how Sean used to like to bang on the car windows if she and her date would start steaming them up.

"We can talk about the kind of action I _will_ be getting," she posed smartly, looking back up at me with that smile of hers.

"Or not," Sean said quickly. "How about we do this debriefing instead? I mean, come on. You guys have been married for six months. The honeymoon's over, right?"

"No," we both answered at the same time.

"Apparently yours isn't over, either," Alex added pointedly.

"What can I say?" Sean asked proudly. "I'm a stud."

Mike barked out a laugh, and then looked over at Lupo.

"So where's Bernard? He said he was coming."

"I practically had to guilt Lauren into coming," Alex remarked.

"I'm guessing that they won't be walking in together," Lupo replied.

And sure enough, after another minute, Bernard walked in, along with Cutter and Mulder.

Introductions were made and drinks were ordered, and after a few more minutes, John and Mary came in, followed by Hayes.

After John and Mary sat down, the only remaining chair was next to Bernard, and I noticed that Hayes pulled it slightly away from him before she sat down.

"So…Mulder," Alex was saying. "How hard would it be for you to find a numbered bank account in the Caymans?"

"Is this a trick question?"

"No," she replied, and she laughed lightly but I wasn't sure if it was in response to his confusion or because I had my arm around her and my fingers were stroking her skin just beneath the hem of her shirt.

She's pretty ticklish, and sure enough, she shifted slightly and then cast me a harmless admonishing look before finishing her statement.

"We don't have the number, or the specific bank, or the exact balance."

"What do you know?" he asked curiously.

"It was opened using my name," Carolyn filled in. "And it has roughly fourteen million dollars."

"Chutes and ladders, dude. I mean, ma'am. Or…"

"Carolyn," Carolyn told him. "My first name is fine. And does that mean it's easy to do?"

"Yeah, um…Carolyn. Yeah, I mean, shit. It's like…like…like asking you to be fine, right? You can't help yourself."

"I think I like you, Mulder," she said, and he blushed and looked down at the table. "So if we come and get you tomorrow, you'll help us find that account?"

"Yes, ma'am. Carolyn. Sure."

"I'd like you to write a program for me, too," Lupo said. "Something to help us shrink our search parameters."

"For Carl?"

"That's right."

"I'm your man, Lupo," Mulder said seriously, and then he looked adoringly at Connie. "I know I didn't want to leave the crib, but…I'm in it now, and I really want to help you catch this guy."

"I actually understood every word you just said," Cutter said in amusement. "I think I need to buy you a beer. Or…are you old enough?"

"I think he's about the same age as Hayes, right?" Lupo teased, trying to pull Lauren into the conversation.

So far, she'd been sipping on a beer and staying mostly quiet, but she smiled at Lupo's ribbing.

"You want to see my ID, Lupo?"

"I think so, yeah," he challenged.

"Um...I think she's older than me," Mulder said, not getting that they were joking. "I mean, she's a detective, right?"

"Thank you, Mulder," Lauren said. "And yeah, I'm a detective, so…"

"So you have to be at least in your late twenties, because you would've gone to college, and then the academy, and then spent some time in a uniform…"

He paused when he realized we were all looking at him.

"I live on a computer, remember?" he answered with a shrug.

The conversation moved in another direction and I was only partly listening because apparently Alex had decided that she didn't need her sole available hand for drinking, and instead she'd put it on my thigh, imitating my earlier position on her, only she was being much more daring as to its exact location.

We were going to have to get out of here.

_Soon_.

But then motion across the room caught my eye and I looked over to see Liz and Ross making their way towards our table.

"I guess their plans changed," I said to Alex.

"Well, they're here, so everything must be okay."

"How long do we need to stay to be sociable?" I asked her, once again leaning close so that I could whisper into her ear.

"Did you have somewhere you'd rather be?" she replied coyly as she gently squeezed my thigh, sending another shot of arousal through me.

If I got any more turned on, I was going to have to borrow her jacket to carry in front of me when it was time to leave.

With my lips still close to her ear, I exhaled lightly, causing her to shiver from the feel of my breath.

I wanted her to be right there with me.

"Where would I rather be? I can think of one place in particular…"

TBC...


	51. Chapter 51

**Logan POV**

* * *

><p>"Hey, kiddo, let's take a walk."<p>

"I don't…I was just…"

"Yeah, I know. But I need to sneak a cigarette and Carolyn will kick my ass if she sees me, so you'll be doing me a favor if you just walk with me for a few minutes."

Hayes looked at me dubiously, with one hand still on the door.

We'd been sitting in Steve-O's for less than an hour and she was already about to bolt, after contributing very little to the conversation.

And maybe I was reading this whole thing wrong, but with all of the bits and pieces I'd put together, I thought I knew what was going on with her.

Or at least, the generality of it.

And call me crazy, but I think she's a sweet kid, and I really hated to see her isolate herself.

I mean, if she didn't want to date Bernard, then that was her choice, but she was closing herself off from the rest of us, too, and it was too late for that.

She was already in the fold, which meant that we looked out for one another, so when a moment ago, I saw her get up from the table with barely a word to anyone, I'd glanced at Carolyn and found her looking back at me.

"_Go,"_ she said with a nod.

"_Are you sure?"_

"_I'm thinking the two of you might connect."_

Which told me that she'd reached the same conclusion as me.

Because we'd both heard Jeffries call out to Bernard that he had a message from Detective Benson, over in Manhattan SVU, and we knew damn well that Bernard wasn't working an MCS case that had anything to do with SVU, and it had been shortly thereafter that Alex and Bobby had run into him and Hayes in the hallway, halfway into an argument.

"Come on," I added in my most persuasive voice. "Five minutes."

She reluctantly nodded her head and then pushed open the door, so I followed her outside.

"You don't smoke," she accused lightly once we were out on the sidewalk.

"How do you know?"

"I've never seen you. And I've never smelled it on you. And if Carolyn didn't want you to do it, then you wouldn't."

"You think I let her tell me what to do?"

"I think with something like that, you love her enough to respect her wishes."

"Maybe," I agreed thoughtfully.

"Definitely."

"You think you know me so well?" I asked in amusement.

"No," she admitted, casting a glance in my direction. "But I've watched the two of you together."

"Huh. Yeah, being friends with detectives…it's exhausting sometimes, isn't it? It's tough to have secrets."

She was quiet for a few steps, and I figured that she'd already sniffed me out.

"Did Bernard ask you to talk to me?"

"No," I answered quickly. "He wouldn't do that."

"But he told you about what's going on."

"No," I said again. "He hasn't said a word. But like I said…when you're friends with detectives…"

"Yeah," she replied on a sigh.

"Hey, it's none of my business what goes on between you and Bernard. But you know why they initiated the no-fraternization rule, right?"

"We're disrupting the flow of the squad room," she said suddenly, coming to a stop in the middle of the sidewalk. "Did the chief ask you to talk to me? Oh my God, I can't believe that I let it get so bad, it's just that…"

"Lauren, relax. You're not in trouble. I was just trying to make an analogy," I assured her. I paused for a minute, regrouping my thoughts, and then I started again. "See, we're all friends with Bernard, and now we're friends with you, too. And whatever happened between the two of you…well, it happened. But you guys need to work it out so that we can still all be friends, just like you'd have to do if you were going to keep working together."

We started walking again, and she was silent for a moment, but then she responded.

"Yeah, but you know, I'll be going back to the 2-7 on Monday, and then it'll be pretty easy for you guys to do your own thing…I mean, these past few weeks have been great, but…"

"So that's it? You're dumping him, and the rest of us, too? You know, I've got to tell you, if it was just me, I'd understand. Before Carolyn, I got dropped more times than a chicken lays eggs, but…the others. Bobby, Alex, Carolyn…all of them. They're great people and they're loyal friends, and that's not easy to find these days."

"Why do you do that?" she asked quietly, stopping again and putting a hand on my arm to get me to look at her.

"Do what?"

"Separate yourself from them."

"I don't know…I guess I've always felt like I don't really measure up."

"But…you do," she insisted. "I mean, you're great. Hell, you're out here talking to me, trying to get me to…I don't know what. Be friends, I guess. You don't have to care about me, but you do. I mean, you must, or you would've just let me walk away."

"That's true."

"Why?"

"I'm going to tell you something," I said, and as the words left my mouth, my heart began to pound a little faster.

What if I was wrong about her?

But then I thought, did it really matter?

The people I loved already knew the truth, so what did it hurt to share it with her on the off-chance that it would help her?

And really, it was more than an off-chance.

I'm a pretty good judge of character.

Hell, everyone back in the bar was, and we all liked her.

And Carolyn had seen in her the same things I did.

So it was a safe bet.

"Okay," she said cautiously.

We were still standing in the middle of the sidewalk, so I moved over against the building and she came to stand next to me.

"When I was a kid, my mother used to beat the crap out of me. And I mean, on a daily basis. And before I even hit puberty, I was molested by my priest. After that, I went through a span of about twenty years when I had sex with any woman who said yes, and there were a lot of times when I didn't even know their name. Now, does that sound like what you'd expect of my past?"

"It's…um…no," she said, clearly surprised by my candor as well as the facts. "But you…you're so together."

"_Now_, yeah. But tell me this…do you think my wife is crazy to love me?"

"No," she answered quickly.

"I mean, I've been through it. I've been used and abused. And I try to never use it as an excuse for anything, ever, but it's still _there_, you know? It's still part of me."

"But it's in the past."

"Uh huh," I said, nodding at her meaningfully. "Just like whatever's in your past that's come back to mess with your head."

"It's not the same," she said slowly.

"Maybe not. Because I don't know your secret. But I do know what it feels like to not feel good enough. To not want the person I love to settle. But in the end, I had to trust her and respect her feelings. Because she's got a past of her own, and it's not a competition about whose is worse. It's just about finding that one person who makes your life a little better. And I've got to tell you, you looked pretty happy the last couple of weeks, and so did Bernard. And the past two days you've both been miserable."

"But it's…it's…"

She broke off and ran her hand through her hair, apparently forgetting that she had it in a ponytail. After her fingers caught in the captured strands, she reached back and pulled out the band, shaking her hair loose as she tucked the band into her pocket.

"Do you want kids?" she asked, and it threw me for a second because the question came from left field.

"Uh…no."

"What if you did?"

"Okay…"

"And Carolyn couldn't have them."

"Then we'd…adopt, or…use a surrogate or something."

"Wouldn't that make you resent her for not being able to give you what you want?"

"Why on earth would I resent her for something beyond her control? I love her for who she is, not because of her ability to reproduce."

And yeah, so I was a little slow catching on to where she was going, but I finally got it.

"And you know what would really make me mad?" I added.

"What?"

"If she made the decision for me," I said pointedly.

She stared at me for a minute, and I could see why Bernard was so hung up on her. Her beauty aside, she's smart and intense and I could practically see her weighing my words.

Don't get me wrong…she's not Carolyn.

But I can be objective about seeing the attractiveness of another woman without personally being attracted.

See? I've matured a lot lately.

"Ready to go back?" I asked her after another minute.

"You didn't smoke," she said with a smirk.

"What are you talking about? I don't smoke," I answered, nudging her with my shoulder as we headed back towards Steve-O's.

"I knew it. You don't lie very well."

"Lying is overrated, kiddo. Trust me on that one."

"Do you …um…do you…"

"We've got a four-minute walk back. That's your window for unfettered access," I offered.

"Your priest," she began, and I almost regretted my offer, but I took a deep breath and waited to hear her out. Because I'd had a feeling that would be the aspect she latched on to. "How did you get over that? Did you get counseling?"

"No," I said, barking out a laugh. "Definitely not. Um…I was in denial for a very long time. And I'm not saying that I'm over it. I've just learned to live with it."

"Do you worry that maybe Carolyn…you know…thinks about that?"

"Only in the sense that if he was still alive, she'd probably kill him. See, that's the thing about sharing painful memories with someone you love. They take on your pain as their own. And it helps, I promise. If you let it."

"I rushed it."

"What do you mean?"

"Bernard's not in love with me. I shouldn't have told him yet, but when I started having the nightmares again I felt like I was hiding things from him. I had to tell him the truth because waiting until he fell in love with me would've just benefitted me, right? It wouldn't have been fair to him."

"Waiting…" I began in confusion, but then I stopped myself.

How could she not see that he was already in love with her?

Probably because she was too wrapped up in the idea that he could do better.

Sheesh, was there anyone, _ever_, who thought they were good enough for the person they fell in love with?

"So…tell me this. You told him your secret, and he broke up with you?"

"Well…no."

"You broke up with him. Because of his reaction?"

"No."

"You just decided that you know what's best for him. Lauren…" I said, shaking my head. "Classic mistake. You know how much you hate it when your parents insist that they know what's best for you, right?"

She'd told me and Carolyn about her childhood in St. Paul, and how her parents were devastated that she hadn't finished law school. And how that was the main topic of conversation on the rare occasions when they called.

"It's infuriating."

"Exactly."

"This isn't the same," she argued. And then she sighed and shook her head, and said quietly, "Yes, it is. Oh my God…"

By this point, we were back at the entrance of Steve-O's.

"So, are you coming in?" I asked her. "Or are you going home?"

"You could've had a career as a therapist," she joked uneasily. She ran her hand through her hair again, only this time it seemed like she was making sure it was in order rather than as a nervous habit. "Fine, I'm coming in."

I opened the door for her, but as she went past, I told her, "Any time you want to talk about what happened, you know where to find me."

"Thanks, Logan. Carolyn's really lucky to have you."

"Just like Bernard will be lucky to have you if you'd ever quit being an idiot," I told her with a grin. "So get inside, kiddo. We're missing the debriefing."

"You know, I'm thirty-five," she said as we walked together through the bar to the row of tables in the back.

"I'm gonna have to see the birth certificate on that one."

TBC...


	52. Chapter 52

**Liz POV**

* * *

><p>"You think he's okay?"<p>

"You mean, do I think he's out drinking and doing drugs?"

Danny looked at me worriedly and shrugged.

"Not necessarily," he answered. "I just mean do you think he's _okay_."

"The text said that he was catching up with an old friend, right? I think that's a good thing. I haven't heard him mention any of his friends from Johns Hopkins. I don't think those kids are talking to him anymore, so if an old high school buddy wants to hang out with him…"

"Yeah, I know you're right."

"And as for the drinking and drugs…I don't see it. I'm pretty sure he's done with drugs altogether, and I'm not saying that he'll never drink again, but a week after what happened? No."

"Right again," he admitted with a wry smile. He was holding my hand as we walked down the sidewalk toward Steve-O's, and with his concession, he brought my hand to his lips and kissed the knuckles. "You have an annoying habit of often being right."

"Annoying, huh?"

"Endearing," he corrected, now grinning fully.

"Uh huh. Good save," I joked. "Now stop worrying about Jeremy. A little fun with someone his own age will be good for him. And we'll have a little fun with people _our_ age, and then we'll go home and wait for him so that I can give him the test when he gets home."

"The test? You're going to make him pee in a cup?"

"No, Danny," I said on a laugh. "I'm going to hug him. Tightly, so that I can smell him. Smoke, liquor…it's easily detectable from a simple close-range sniff test."'

"Okay, that's it. You're not allowed to hang out with the Gorens anymore," he teased.

"Too late," I said, as he pulled open the door of Steve-O's and then stood back to let me walk in ahead of him. "They've already taught me everything they know."

"God help us all," he muttered good-naturedly.

It wasn't hard to spot our friends, considering they took up the entire back wall of the restaurant.

And the group had grown since the last time.

If we had any more people join us, we were going to have to start renting out a banquet hall just for our debriefings.

"I don't think anyone would've missed us," Danny said quietly as we crossed the crowded room.

It was Friday night, after all, and I had no doubt that it was only due to our repeated patronage that allowed us to snag so many tables.

"Of course they would," I argued.

Although I wasn't so sure.

I took a quick headcount and came up with fourteen, not including us. Our usual group of ten had expanded, with the inclusion of John and Mary, Sean Eames and his wife Alicia, and the odd addition of Mike Cutter and a young kid with whom I wasn't familiar.

"Dr. Rodgers," Cutter greeted, standing up to offer me his chair while at the same time, Bernard moved to grab two chairs from a nearby table.

"I didn't think you were coming," Alex said.

"Jeremy made plans, so our schedule opened up," Danny answered as he eyeballed the kid.

"Chief, this is the computer whiz I've been telling you about," Lupo spoke up. "Call him Mulder."

"Chief? As in the Chief of Police?" the kid asked, standing up to shake Danny's hand. "You mean like…you're their boss?"

"Chief of Detectives," Danny corrected. "And I think I'm their boss, yeah, but sometimes it's really hard to tell."

"Not my boss," Connie said with a grin.

"Or mine," I added, shaking Mulder's hand.

"Yeah, more the other way around with her," Danny said, tipping his head towards me.

"Liz is the medical examiner," Bobby supplied.

"Oh, now that sounds totally awesome. Have you ever examined someone who died from necrotizing fasciitis? Or what about something like chemical exposure? Have you ever seen…"

"Mulder," Lupo interrupted, after having caught sight of the look on Alicia's face. "Not really dinner table material."

"Oh, shit, man. I'm sorry. It's just…pretty neat stuff, isn't it, Doc?"

"It can be," I told him.

He looked like he wanted to ask more questions, but other conversations cropped up around the table, so he let it go.

We'd only made it through our first drink when Lauren quietly got up from the table and headed for the front door. Her blanket goodbye was barely audible, but as soon as she stepped away, everyone's attention went to her.

I looked at Bernard, who was watching her retreating form, and then I looked questioningly around the table. By the time my gaze got to the Logans, Mike was getting up from the table so that he could follow her to the door.

"Should I ask?"

"It's nothing," Bernard said. "Let her go."

"It's not nothing," Carolyn replied.

"No, it's not," Mary agreed.

"You really want to let her go?" Alex asked Bernard, and then she glanced over at the door where Mike and Lauren were still standing. "I'll go get Mike right now."

"She has a right to be mad," he said lamely. "This isn't her fault. It's mine."

"Then why aren't _you_ running after her?" Danny asked practically, and I loved that he was letting himself get so involved.

By this time, Lauren had left with Mike, and through the windows, I could see the two of them walk away on the sidewalk. I was curious as to the nature of the spat, because I was completely in the dark about what was going on, but I'd have to let her tell me later. Now certainly wasn't the time to ask for details.

"She was pretty clear about what she wanted," Bernard answered.

"And yet she came here tonight," Carolyn pointed out.

Bernard didn't respond, and silence fell over the table, so then Mary spoke up to invite everyone to a housewarming party.

"And no gifts," she said firmly. "I wouldn't know where to put it, and there's honestly nothing I need."

"Certainly not a new necklace," Alex pointed out, and Mary self-consciously grabbed onto the oversized diamond hanging from a chain around her neck.

"Well, someone seems to think he can't leave the zip code without bringing me a present."

"You love it," John insisted, wrapping his arm around her shoulders and pulling her to him.

"A little bit," Mary hedged, but she definitely looked happy. She planted a quick kiss on him and then turned to Bobby. "So, what exactly did you have to do to get Alex to wear that sling another week? I thought for sure it'd be long gone by now."

"I'm not telling," Alex answered for him. "But if he doesn't do it again, this thing's coming off in the morning."

Everyone laughed except Mulder, who looked confused, but the banter kept up until ten minutes later when Mike and Lauren came back.

The conversation slowed down as Lauren looked uncertainly around the table, and said, "I'm sorry. I'm…sorry."

"For what?" Mike asked as he went back around to his seat. "Trying to escape the madness of this group? Believe me, if I thought I could make it past the door without being hog-tied and dragged back inside, I'd try it in a second."

I didn't know what had transpired, or what was so upsetting to her to make her want to leave, but I loved Mike even more for bringing her back and then trying to smooth over the awkwardness.

The dialogue picked up again, this time with Alex making the announcement for Sean about his impending double arrival, but I continued to surreptitiously watch Lauren as she eased into the chair next to Bernard.

"I'm sorry," she said to him in a voice so soft that I could barely hear her.

He watched her for a second and then slowly pushed her hair back behind her shoulder, letting his hand linger against her for a moment longer than necessary.

"Don't be sorry."

"But…"

"We'll talk about it."

"Tonight?" she asked, looking scared and hopeful at the same time.

As if she thought he might say no.

Could the girl really not see that he was in love with her?

He nodded his agreement and then settled his arm around her shoulders.

I forced myself to look away, feeling like a voyeur for witnessing their moment, and at the same time feeling unrepentant because I liked them both too much. I wanted them to be happy.

It didn't take long for things to shift into our usual myriad of relaxed conversations and before I knew it, more than three hours had passed.

"Check on Jeremy," I said quietly to Danny.

For some reason, it bothered me a little that he hadn't texted since the one earlier, asking to beg off of dinner. Over the past week, he'd been really good about keeping in contact with us, and he had to know that his father would be worrying about him, out on a Friday night.

Danny quickly pulled out his phone, and I could imagine that he'd been wanting to check on his son for quite some time, but was probably only waiting until I encouraged it. I knew he was worried about being overprotective, or stifling his now-grown son, but…this situation was different than most.

I looked over his shoulder as he typed the simple text.

_**Everything okay?**_

He kept it in his hand while he waited for a response, and I grabbed onto his other hand while I jumped back into the conversation.

"It was some seriously crazy shit, right?" Mulder was saying. "I mean, I'm sitting there, jamming through the I's and O's and then Yahtzee, man. I'm looking at the AES of the freaking _gate_keeper, right?"

"AES?" I asked, as if _that_ was the only part of his statement I didn't understand.

"Annual earnings statement," he told me with a meaningful nod.

"You hacked someone's financial information?" Mary asked him while at the same time, Lupo tried to get his attention, presumably to get him to stop talking.

"Bill Gates," he clarified, oblivious to Lupo's attempts.

Mary looked at him incredulously and then looked around the table before settling her gaze back on the young genius.

"You know I'm a United States Marshal, right? And that you're at a table filled with cops and district attorneys?"

"Hey, I just _looked_," he insisted as his face went white. "I didn't…shit, I didn't like _steal_ it or anything. Shit, man...Lupo?"

Mary continued to glare at him for a moment longer, and then she broke into a grin, and everyone else started laughing.

"I'm just messing with you. Although, you might want to rethink perusing through other people's information for sport. Honestly, I'm surprised that the FBI hasn't recruited you yet. They like to go for true hackers, you know, and it sounds like you're the real deal."

"Nah, man, _Lupo's_ the real deal," he deflected, showing open admiration. He also turned from white to red at Mary's compliment. "I just know a little bit about computers."

"A little bit," Cutter scoffed. "Please. You got my system back on its feet in less than twenty-four hours."

"Pre-K shit, Mr. C."

"Uh huh. To _you_, maybe."

"Yeah, well if you can find my account in the Caymans, then I'll call the FBI myself and tell them they need to bring you in," Carolyn told him.

"Bring me in?" he questioned nervously.

"As an employee. You're missing the boat if you don't market your skills," she said soothingly.

"She's right," Bobby agreed. "And when the Bureau brings in a hacker, all is forgiven."

"Really? I mean, not that I've done anything wrong."

"Geneva?" Lupo supplied with a grin.

"Yeah, so…you've got connections at the FBI?" he asked Carolyn, ignoring Lupo's ribbing.

"She's on a first name basis with the director," Mike answered, looking pointedly at his wife and smiling fully.

She flashed him a sarcastic grin and said, "Yeah, well, maybe I should use a different contact. That is, if you're interested."

"Think about it," Alex urged him when it looked like he was going to say no. "You could have a great career ahead of you."

"Yeah, and if you decide the Bureau's not for you, give me a call," John said. "I could put you to work, too."

"So can I," Danny offered.

"What do you do?" Mulder asked John.

"You don't want to work for him," Mary answered. "He'll have you hacking into competitors' systems to find out how high they're willing to go on a bid…"

"I know," John agreed quickly, although I could tell he was kidding. "Just think how much money I could've saved on the Millennium if I'd known ahead of time their basement price."

"Wait, you bought the Millennium?" Mulder asked loudly. "You're _that_ John? Like, John _Strathmore_?"

"Um…yeah," John said, clearly surprised that Mulder knew who he was.

"Dude! I trolled your QR a couple of weeks ago! Holy shit! I didn't know guys like you hung out in places like this!"

"You…hacked me?"

"Oh…I mean…well, I was just creepin' on the F5. You know…the cat."

"Okay, now you have to hire him," Mary said with her typical sarcasm. "He's already been trolling your QR and creeping your F5. Next thing you know, he's going to be scoping your CAQ and that just might put me over the edge."

"Whoa, hey, I would never scope his CAQ, right?"

Mary just started at him blankly while Alex burst out laughing.

"I think the point is," Lupo spoke up. "You need to put your skills to use in a valid, legal environment, or you're going to end up back in the clink."

"I'm feeling you," Mulder said to him, and then he looked back at John. "And I'm sorry for skulking in your P&L, man, but it's just…wow. You're like the Colorado, right? Only with a little more chlorophyll."

"I don't think you want him," Bobby warned John. "It would be too tempting."

"You might be right," John agreed with a grin. "Start with the feds."

"No, start with my account in the Caymans," Carolyn corrected.

"I hate to cut this party short, but even with Mulder's brilliance, I've got a huge backlog at the office, so I'm going to have to go in early tomorrow," Cutter said as he got up from the table. "And I still have to drive to Jersey tonight."

"And then someone's got to go back and get him in the morning?" Mike questioned.

"That's silly," Connie said to Mulder. "You can sleep on our couch tonight. I mean, if you want."

"You mean like…in your house?"

"Well, our apartment, but…yeah."

That sparked a stream of dialogue from Mulder that I'm pretty sure no one understood, and at the same time, Cutter made his exit.

"Still nothing from Jeremy?" I asked Danny quietly.

"No."

"Let's go home. Maybe he's already there and he went to bed early. I don't think he slept much last night."

So we got up and said our goodbyes and then headed for home.

Danny sent Jeremy a second text along the way, and I was suddenly extremely worried.

Of what specifically I can't say, but the last time he'd ignored us was when he'd gone looking for Kenny.

Danny had mentioned that Bobby and Alex didn't think Kenny would've killed himself, and I agreed with their assessment of the unusual nature of suicide by ketamine.

But we were in New York.

Even if he remembered something, he surely wouldn't have gone to Baltimore alone, especially not when he knew we'd be checking up on him.

"Finally," Danny said when his phone buzzed as we headed up the front walk.

We both breathed a sigh of relief as he looked at the message.

_**"Sorry – I didn't hear it buzz the first time,"**_ Danny read aloud. "_**I'm having a good time, and behaving myself so don't worry."**_

"Don't worry," I scoffed. "Easy for him to say."

Danny chuckled and then finished reading the message.

_**"It's Friday. You and your wife should go out and have some fun."**_

"You and _your wife_?" I questioned, and just like that, the niggling worry from before turned into full-fledged fear. "Jeremy would never call me that."

"But it's what you are," Danny reasoned, although he sounded unsure.

"He would've said Liz," I insisted.

We both stopped, each of us halfway up the front steps.

"Which means _what_?"

"This message isn't from him. Or it is, and he's trying to tell us something."

TBC...


	53. Chapter 53

**Hayes POV**

* * *

><p>I've been on a roller coaster these past couple of days with Bernard.<p>

And I _hate_ roller coasters.

That feeling of powerlessness when you go hurtling down the three hundred foot plus drop of the ubiquitous first hill…just not my thing.

And don't get me wrong.

I can be adventurous.

Just as long as I'm in control.

After my conversation with Bernard during the stake out, I was starting to feel a little better.

Although it was messing with my mind to know that my rapist had been caught.

Ten _years_ ago.

And that he'd killed his victim, the one he'd attacked after me.

Was it really only because I'd complied to his demands?

Or had he just escalated?

Had his victim been just as scared as me…just as submissive and yet he'd shot her anyway?

There was really no way to know.

Unless I asked him.

Which I was going to do.

Because I was going to go to Frackville and have a sit down with him. I thought maybe it would help me to feel more in control.

And I liked that Bernard wanted to go with me, even after I'd treated him so poorly.

He was giving me the room I needed to breathe, while offering me support at the same time.

He's such a great guy.

Of course, that's not exactly what I called him this afternoon after he returned the phone call to Olivia.

"_What did she want?"_ I asked him.

"_He's up for parole in three months."_

He.

I still didn't even know the guy's name.

I didn't want to know yet.

But the anonymity didn't stop me from being outraged at the justice system.

"_After ten years? It was rape and murder!"_

"_Shhh,"_ he reminded me.

We were still at our desks at that point, so we got up and wandered down the hall, just outside of an empty interrogation room.

"_Olivia wants the go-ahead to formally press charges. With the DNA match, it'll be open and shut,"_ he continued. "_And even if it's not settled before his parole hearing, the additional pending charges will keep him behind bars."_

"_Formally press charges,"_ I repeated. "_Which means it'll be public knowledge."_

I could feel the panic rolling through me at the prospect.

"_You think it'll be in the paper?"_

"_At the very least, it'll go to the DA's office. Which means that Connie could prosecute it, right?" _I pointed out, and I could hear the rising anxiety in my voice.

"_Well, I guess it's possible, but there are lots of ADA's."_

"_But she could. Or she could hear about it from a colleague. And you know as well as I do that once something like that gets started…it'll be all over the 2-7 before I even get back to work on Monday."_

"_Lauren…"_

"_Damn you for opening this door,"_ I bit out. _"I was going along just fine…"_

"_No, you weren't!"_

"_I don't want to do this,"_ I argued. "_It was bad enough the first time around. I changed departments three times, but rumors and innuendo follow me everywhere I go. And even when people don't know specifically about the rape, my reaction to it still makes me look bad, because I tend to make friends with the men so that I can make sure they're trustworthy, and then the women hate me because they think I'm a squad car…but it's not like that at the 2-7. It's been good. And believe me, even though I was only there for a few weeks before I started working with you, it's never taken longer than that before, so I'd know if people were talking, but they're not and I don't want to screw that up. You have no idea how hard I've worked to escape it."_

I stopped my pleading rant and held his gaze while I sucked in an unsteady breath.

"_They don't publicize the names of rape victims_," he said quietly.

"_But cops and lawyers know them anyway. You know that."_

"_What if he gets paroled?"_

"_He won't."_

"_What are you going to do, just bury your head in the sand and hope that it doesn't happen?"_

I knew he was right, but I couldn't accept it at the moment, and I didn't like the feeling of helplessness, like if I didn't make the announcement to the world about what had happened, then a murderer would walk.

How could _that_ be on _my_ shoulders?

"_I'm going to do what feels right to me and I really don't need you or anyone else telling me what that should be."_

I stopped talking when Alex and Bobby appeared in the hallway.

I was mortified that maybe they'd heard some of our conversation, but they didn't act like it.

We spoke with them for several minutes about the progress of the case, and then they went on into the squad room.

Of course, before they left, Alex got me to promise that I'd go to Steve-O's with everyone. I'd already told Carolyn maybe, and I honestly had no plans to go, but when Alex asked me, I caved.

I like her too much – I didn't want to disappoint her.

Once we were alone in the hall again, Bernard said gently, _"Lauren, don't be scared."_

But I was.

And I hated that he knew that about me.

I wanted him to think of me as fearless.

And untarnished.

And…more like Alex.

But since he clearly saw my flaws, I lashed out.

"_And don't you be an asshole,"_ I fired back. _"It's my decision, so butt the hell out."_

I didn't talk to him again after that. Not about anything personal anyway. We worked in silence for another hour, and then he got up to leave.

"_I guess I'll see you tonight," _he said quietly as he put on his jacket.

I didn't want to look at him, but I did.

His charcoal gray suit…the white shirt that looked like he'd pulled it from the laundry hamper…a red and navy silk tie that didn't exactly match…he looked a mess and yet still so handsome.

His cheeks were covered in more than a five o'clock shadow. Loo had been a stickler for her detectives being clean shaven, but Ross didn't really care about that, so Bernard often went a day or two without shaving.

Tonight, it looked like it had been longer.

And his eyes were tired, making him look every one of his forty-three years.

_I'm doing this to him_, I thought. _He didn't sleep last night because of me._

I realized that he was watching me, waiting for my response, but I suddenly felt choked up and was afraid to speak.

Instead, I gave him a nod and refocused on the paperwork in front of me.

I'd waited until I was sure that he'd left the building and then I took the subway to the station nearest Steve-O's. As I walked the last little bit, I ran into John and Mary.

"_Where's Bernard?"_ John had asked me.

"_You know, I am my own person. I can go places without Bernard,"_ I replied smartly. The two of them just looked at me and I sighed heavily and closed my eyes. _"I'm sorry. That was uncalled for. He's…already here, I guess."_

"_So you two didn't talk last night?"_ Mary asked me.

"_We did."_

"_And…"_

"_And nothing. I told him everything."_

"_And then he left?"_

"_I asked him to."_

"_Lauren,"_ Mary began, but I held up my hand, stopping her argument.

"_Not right now, okay?"_ I asked pleadingly. _"I'm just going to go inside, have a drink, and then go home."_

"_To feel sorry for yourself?"_

"_Mary," _John chastised. "_Cut her some slack."_

"_Yeah, Mary,_" I said, and I had to smile at the look Mary gave John. "_Cut me some slack. It's not like you don't know where to find me if you get the urge to try to make me talk." _

So Mary conceded, and the three of us went inside. Of course, the only vacant seat was one next to Bernard. I pulled it slightly away from him before I sat down.

"_Being an asshole isn't contagious,"_ he'd said under his breath. "_I think you're safe."_

I wanted to laugh, partly from relief that he was making a joke about what I'd called him and partly because I was so damn tired of being sad.

But I didn't.

Instead, I ordered a drink and sat quietly while everyone else enjoyed themselves. I said very little, and as soon as I thought no one would notice, I made my escape.

Or, almost.

Logan caught me at the door.

"_Hey, kiddo, let's take a walk."_

"_I don't…I was just…"_

"_Yeah, I know. But I need to sneak a cigarette and Carolyn will kick my ass if she sees me, so you'll be doing me a favor if you just walk with me for a few minutes."_

He was full of shit, but I couldn't resist him.

He has such a way about him.

So we walked and he talked.

And I couldn't believe the things he said.

At first I thought he was making it up, trying to show me that my past didn't have to effect me any more than I let it.

But the really sad thing was that he _wasn't_ making it up.

Those terrible things had really happened to him.

"_But you…you're so together,"_ I insisted.

And he was. I mean, he was such a nice guy, and he treated Carolyn like she was just the most special person in the world, and if I weren't so hung up on Bernard, I could easily see myself having a huge one-sided crush on him.

"Now_, yeah,"_ he answered in a conspiratorial tone. "_But tell me this…do you think my wife is crazy to love me?"_

"_No," _I answered immediately.

Absolutely not.

"_I mean, I've been through it. I've been used and abused. And I try to never use it as an excuse for anything, ever, but it's still _there_, you know? It's still part of me."_

And it finally occurred to me what he was trying to say.

At first, I thought that he knew. That maybe Bernard had told him, but deep down, I knew Bernard would never break my trust.

But maybe it was just something that Logan recognized in me…something similar to his own past. I don't know, but I started thinking that maybe there was hope for me yet.

So I pushed it, and I broached the other issue.

The fact that I can't have kids.

"_Wouldn't that make you resent her for not being able to give you what you want?" _I asked him, trying to get a feel for the man's perspective of the situation.

"_Why on earth would I resent her for something beyond her control? I love her for who she is, not because of her ability to reproduce,"_ he'd said easily.

And then he told me that what would make him mad was if she didn't let him make his own decision.

Which was pretty much what Bernard had said.

And Mary.

And Alex.

And I had to be the dumbest person in the world to ignore advice from so many smart people.

We turned around and headed back towards Steve-O's, and I was already trying to decide what in the world I was going to say to Bernard.

Logan and I teased each other a little, and I think he was trying to help pull me out of my funk before we rejoined the others, but I still had to know one more thing.

"_Do you worry that maybe Carolyn…you know…thinks about that?"_ I asked him, referring to his traumatic experience with his priest.

Because that bothered me a lot with Bernard.

Now that he knew, I didn't want him thinking about it. I didn't want him censoring himself, or wondering if I was thinking about it, or…I don't know. But we'd been having some really, really great sex over the past week and I didn't want this to screw it up.

Assuming he ever wanted to sleep with me again, after the way I'd been treating him.

Logan and I wrapped up our conversation, and I was suddenly anxious to get Bernard alone.

To make things right, I mean.

Logan's comment about sharing things with someone who cares making it easier to bear…I realized that's what Bernard had been trying to do, and since I'd shut him out, he'd reacted by trying to find the guy because he'd had to do _something_ and I'd closed all the other doors.

It was fairly awkward going back inside after I'd acted like such a…I don't know.

Kid.

Maybe that was why Logan and Lupo both liked to tease me about my age. Because I certainly wasn't acting like much of an adult lately.

But Logan was sweet, and smoothed over my return, so I pulled my chair closer to Bernard and sat down, and I thought about how much I hate roller coasters.

But with those, I _was_ out of control.

And now, I didn't have to be.

It might not be up to me how _Bernard_ responded, but it was up to me how _I_ acted from here on out.

And I had to quit acting like I don't want him when I do.

"I'm sorry," I whispered to him.

For being a bitch.

For pushing him away.

For calling him an asshole.

For everything.

He brought his eyes to mine, holding my gaze as he reached out and pushed my hair behind my shoulder, his fingers brushing lightly against the side of my neck as he did so.

It made butterflies take residence in my stomach and I felt hopeful that there was still a chance for us.

"Don't be sorry."

"But…"

"We'll talk about it."

"Tonight?"

"Just relax," he said softly. "Unwind. And then we'll go home."

His words and his gentle, rumbling tone made me feel emotional and aroused and scared and excited…everything at once.

_Oh my God_, I thought. _I love him_.

But I pushed that thought aside, needing to take things one step at a time.

And first off, I needed to make things right with him.

So I did my best to relax and enjoy the evening, and it worked because the time flew by and before I knew it, people started saying their goodbyes.

"Are you ready to go home?" Bernard asked me after Liz and the chief left. Cutter had already gone, too, and I was pretty sure that Alex and Bobby wouldn't be too far behind.

Those two were so cute together.

And maybe if I didn't idolize Alex so much that I tended to watch her a lot, I probably wouldn't have seen the way that Bobby kept throwing suggestive and seductive looks her way, but since I _do_ idolize her and I _was_ watching her, I picked up on the fact that once again they'd probably be racing home so that they could be alone.

And man, did I want what they had.

Logan and Carolyn, too.

But then I was reminded of Logan's stories, and it hit me that I had no idea about these people's lives, or what it took for them to get where they are.

Probably a lot. I knew that Alex said that she and Bobby danced around each other for years before they got together. _Years_.

And here I'd practically attacked Bernard after a week.

"Lauren?" Bernard asked, and I realized that he was still waiting for my response.

"Yeah, I'm ready. Let's go home."

We barely talked as we went back to my place, but I held his hand the whole way.

I wasn't sure exactly how to start the conversation with him, and I hated that it felt so awkward and strange between us, but it was my doing.

So I had to undo it.

"Do you want something to drink?" I offered after I let us into my apartment.

Janis immediately approached Bernard and clamored for him to pick her up, which to my surprise, he did.

"I think I've had enough," he told me.

"Okay. So…"

"Let's go sit down."

This time, I sat on the couch.

"I'm sorry," I began.

"For?"

"For trying to tell you how you should feel. And for blaming you for talking to Olivia."

"No, you're right to be mad about that. I should've asked you first. It wasn't my place to do that. I just felt so…helpless. And I hate that."

"Yeah," I said with a smile. "I do, too. So I understand why you did it."

"Do you?" he asked earnestly, and once again, he reached out to settle his hand against my throat, and once again it initiated a series of fluttering in my stomach.

"I think so. But go ahead and tell me."

So then I listened to him. Instead of telling him how he was supposed to feel, or how he should react, I let him tell me.

"It makes me so angry that this happened to you," he concluded. "Not because it changes how I see you, but just because you're such a great person…you didn't deserve that. No one does. And the idea that the guy might be walking around…"

"I know. But I guess he's not, huh?"

"I guess not."

"Yet," I added, knowing that's what he was thinking. "I know you want me to tell Olivia to move forward…"

"I want you to do what's right for you. I got a little overzealous earlier because the thought of him getting out after what he did…it was making me a little crazy. But I didn't consider what it might do to you, having to talk about it again and having other people find out."

"Back then…when I went back to work after it happened…I felt like everyone was talking about me," I admitted. "And they probably weren't. Or at least not as much as I thought, but still…I requested a transfer after only a few weeks. I just waited long enough for the bruises to heal so that no one would ask questions at the new precinct."

I saw the emotional look that crossed his face when I mentioned the bruises.

"You didn't see the pictures?" I asked him.

"No. I only looked at the computerized version of the file, and it doesn't have photos."

"Oh."

"I wasn't trying to be nosy. I just…I wanted to help you, and I didn't know how to do it."

"I know," I agreed, moving closer to him so that he could wrap his arm around my shoulder. I settled against him, resting my cheek on his chest and sliding my hand around his waist.

"And if you don't want to press charges, then I'm behind you, okay? I'll just rally the witnesses and get family statements for the other girl, the one he's serving time for, and I'll go to his parole hearing myself and make sure he stays where he's at."

"I want to talk to him," I said firmly.

"I know. We'll do it together."

"And I think I'm going to press charges."

I hadn't decided until the words left my mouth, but I knew it was the right thing to do.

And things were different now than before.

I was stronger.

And I had Eames for a partner, and he was great.

And I had friends.

And I had Bernard.

I'd get through it.

"Are you sure?"

"I think so, yeah."

"And what about us?"

"Well, are you sure that you really want to be with me? Because if you're staying out of pity or because…"

"Stop right there," he said, running his hand under my chin and tipping my head up so that I could look him in the eye. "It's not _staying_. You booted me, remember? This is me, being persistent and trying to get you back because I _definitely_ want to be with you."

"Okay," I said, unable to keep from smiling.

"Okay?" he repeated questioningly.

"Uh huh. Okay."

I reached up and kissed him lightly, and then I couldn't stop myself from doing it several more times before reclaiming my position with my cheek against his chest.

He tightened his arm, hugging me closer to him, and I felt him kiss the top of my head.

"I'm so glad you finally came to your senses," he teased.

"Me, too."

TBC...


	54. Chapter 54

**Alex POV**

* * *

><p>"So is this what you had in mind?"<p>

"This is…exactly…what I had in mind."

It was exactly what I'd had on my mind, too, when he'd mentioned that there was someplace else he'd rather be.

Of course, he'd elaborated.

Back at Steve-O's, he'd whispered into my ear things I would've never, in years past, imagined Bobby saying to anyone, let alone to me.

But I'd apparently gotten him worked up, although how specifically I'm not sure.

It didn't seem to take much, and I can't even begin to describe how that knowledge makes me feel.

And of course, it goes both ways.

I often find myself humming with want just from being in his vicinity.

And tonight…tonight he'd tormented me for most of the evening with his subtle and titillating touches, his whispering of suggestions into my ear, and his smoldering looks.

Suffice it to say, I'd reached my limit.

So as soon as we got into the apartment, I was all over him.

Which is how we ended up here, making love up against the front door.

We were both still half dressed, but the foyer looked like an explosion had occurred, with jackets and badges and shoes strewn about.

Our guns were on the table. Those were the only things we'd removed carefully.

But from there on out, it had been a battle of wills, each of us trying to get the other one undressed, each of us fighting for control.

I'd ditched the sling from the get-go, needing the use of both hands, and he hadn't argued, especially not when I wrapped my arms around his neck as he backed me into the door.

He'd immediately picked me up and, as he kissed me – everywhere – as though he couldn't get enough of me, he pushed into me.

Roughly…

Perfectly…

And then he'd paused with his forehead against mine.

And that's when I'd asked him the question.

His response had been shaky.

I thought that he'd stopped to savor the moment, because he liked to do that.

A lot.

But after hearing the tone of his voice, I realized that he'd stopped because he was _that_ close and he was trying to buy himself a little more time.

"Don't hold back on my account," I encouraged.

"This isn't the Goren show," he argued lightly as he started up a slow, drawn-out rhythm that had me leaning my head back against the door and letting out a contented sigh.

"Sure it is," I replied, my voice sounding nearly as breathless as I felt. I was astounded by my ability to string words together at a time like this. "Are you forgetting that I'm a Goren, too?"

His movements faltered, and I opened my eyes to find him staring at me with such emotion.

"How in the world could I ever forget that?" he questioned in a deep, husky tone.

"Then let go."

Because for the past few weeks, he'd been holding back considerably. My shoulder injury always seemed to be somewhere in the back of his mind.

But it was mostly better now.

And as much as I love absolutely everything about Bobby, including his substantial repertoire of love-making techniques, I _really_ love it when he loses control.

Knowing that I can do that to him, and that he trusts me enough to completely give in to his passion…well, that just does things to me.

And even though he worries about finishing ahead of me, that just doesn't happen.

Okay, so maybe it's happened a few times, but even then, he never leaves me hanging. In fact, usually in cases like that, he spends so much time focused on me afterwards, that he ends up being ready for round two before all is said and done.

"Alex…"

His voice was strained and he was still taking it slow, but every muscle was taut with the tension of holding back.

"I'm fine. My shoulder's fine. Do it."

So he did.

And things got kind of hazy for awhile.

And it wasn't over quickly, like he'd thought it might be.

In fact, we went at it up against the front door for quite some time before he grabbed onto me and turned us around, moving into the kitchen where he set me down on the counter.

He drove into me harder and harder as his lips moved feverishly over my skin.

He paused long enough to take my shirt off, and I love that he didn't hesitate before pulling it over my head.

He just did it.

His switch was definitely flipped, and it was all I could do to keep up as he continued to brand my skin with his teeth and whiskers while at the same time maintaining a frenzied rhythm that had already pushed me over the edge.

Twice.

And then the counter wasn't good enough anymore either because he suddenly grabbed onto me again and moved us down to the floor.

The tile felt cold on my back, but that was a good thing considering that my skin was on fire. It added to the nearly overwhelming sensations of the experience.

And then he practically growled my name in a tone I'm pretty sure I've never heard him use before, but one that I really, really like and he had me _right_ there again only this time he was right there with me.

We laid together on the kitchen floor for awhile, with his body covering mine. I could feel his heart racing in his chest and his back was slick with sweat.

Of course, mine was, too.

And I had tears burning my eyes, which I've never understood why that happens sometimes, but it does.

Sometimes the intensity is just _so much_.

"Are you okay?" he asked at last.

"Am I okay?" I repeated incredulously. "Are you kidding me?"

He propped himself up on his forearms so that he could look at me, and I couldn't stop from smiling.

Did he really think that I wasn't okay after _that_?

If I was on death row, I'd request _that_ as my last meal instead of any kind of food product.

"There's that smile again," he commented. "It makes me lose control."

"I'll have to do it more often."

"I think that's what it is," he said, gently running a hand along the side of my face. "The fact that you're so happy with me, it's just the best feeling in the world."

He brought his lips to mine, this time kissing me lightly, lingeringly and affectionately, conveying a much different emotion than our experience from minutes ago.

That had been about passion and desire and need.

This kiss was about love and adoration.

I had it all with him.

Was it any wonder why I smile all the time now?

"I'm kind of waiting for the phone to ring," I admitted when he slowly pulled away.

"It will," he agreed on a chuckle. "But at least it didn't ring earlier. I don't think I could've stopped."

"I would've had to hurt you if you tried."

He smiled broadly at me and got to his feet before holding out a hand to help me up.

"Your shoulder?" he questioned, as though he'd suddenly just remembered it.

"Is perfectly fine," I supplied. "I'm pretty sure I don't need that sling anymore."

"I might agree if you hadn't suggested to everyone that you've only been wearing it because I was providing you with sexual favors. If you show up without it now, they'll think I'm shirking my duties."

"I think the marks on my neck will provide adequate proof that I'm not hurting for attention," I teased.

He glanced quickly in the direction of my neck, and then looked sheepishly back at me.

"Sorry about that," he said without remorse.

"No, you're not," I replied, flashing him a smirk over my shoulder as I led the way into the living room.

It was late, but I wasn't ready to go to bed yet. So Bobby sat down in the recliner and then pulled me down onto his lap. He wrapped his arms around me and I relaxed against him.

We left the room in darkness. In fact, the entire apartment was still dim, with the only light being the one over the stove, which was one that we always kept burning.

It was the perfect end to a pretty decent day.

"You were awfully chatty with that bartender tonight."

"Who, Trevor?"

"That's his name?"

"He's in college. He wanted the scoop on the hottie who was with us the other night," I explained.

"Who was he talking about?"

"Lauren. I guess he noticed her the last time we were in there."

"So he wasn't about to give you his phone number."

"You thought I was serious? He's like…twenty-two."

"So?"

"So…I'm almost twice that."

"So?" he asked again. He had one hand trailing over my back and the other was tracing random patterns along my thigh. "You're a pilf, remember?"

I barked out a laugh and said, "Yeah, that's me. Every school boy's fantasy."

"Yes, you are," he agreed. "And every grown man's fantasy, too."

"Well then…lucky you."

"Exactly."

We were quiet for a few minutes as he continued his gentle stroking of my skin.

"What did you tell Trevor about Lauren?" he asked.

"I told him that she's in a serious relationship. And that she's too old for him."

"I hope you're right. About the relationship, I mean."

"I am. They like each other too much not to fix it."

He hummed his agreement and then moved his hand from my back to my hair, running his fingers through the strands in a manner that was bound to put me to sleep.

He has trouble staying still, but I love the way he channels that energy.

"Mike thinks his father had brown eyes," he remarked. His voice was now a low rumble, telling me that he was getting sleepy, too.

"He doesn't remember for sure?"

"No, which means they're probably not like his."

"That's true, but that doesn't necessarily mean the man wasn't his real father. I mean, my dad's eyes are blue and my mom's are brown, and mine are..."

"The most beautiful shade imaginable," he finished. "Like the color of really good Scotch. Or Brazilian Imperial topaz. Or…"

I laughed at his exuberant descriptiveness, but he tightened his hand in my hair, bringing his lips to mine for a scorching kiss.

I was breathless when he finally broke contact, and then even more so when he smiled at me and resumed stroking my hair.

"Sorry. I just…had to do that."

"Hey, any time the urge hits you…feel free."

"Good to know. So anyway, I think he's going to look into his paternity a little more. I mean, the nurse's recount did make mention that Shannon felt like she was looking at his father's eyes, but she never mentioned him by name. And that color…"

"Maybe she meant the shape instead of the color," I suggested.

"Could be," he agreed. "But it's still worth a look. And Mike said it would be nice to know that he has at least a little bit of decent blood in him."

"He doesn't need to pin down his paternity to know that. It doesn't matter where his blood came from."

"I told him something like that. And he's not upset. I think he's just curious."

We fell silent again, and I was almost asleep when the phone rang.

"Just one Friday night…" I commented as I reluctantly got up from Bobby's lap.

"It's okay," he said amenably as he followed me into the foyer. Our clothes were still strewn everywhere, and I did a visual search for my jacket that held my phone. "We had a nice night up until now."

It was hard to argue with that.

"And we're on the call-out list since we cleared our cases," he added. "Everyone else is still tied up with one thing or another."

I spotted my jacket under the kitchen table.

_Nice distance_, I thought as I retrieved it and pulled out my still-ringing phone.

"It's Ross," I confirmed as I glanced at the display. "What've you got for us, Chief?"

"I need a favor," he said. "And at the rate I'm going, I'm going to end up owing you guys a week in the Caribbean."

"A week? Try a month," I joked. "What do you need?"

"Can you two come to our house? Jeremy's not here, and he's supposedly out with a friend, but…Liz thinks something's wrong."

"Based on what?" I asked as I gathered my clothes so that I could get dressed.

"A text that he sent about two hours ago."

"And you waited two hours to call?"

"I'm trying to give him his space. And I thought she was overreacting," he admitted.

"And now?"

"Now it's after midnight and we still haven't heard from him, and I think I'd like to get your professional opinion."

TBC...


	55. Chapter 55

**Connie POV**

* * *

><p>Mulder's excitement was contagious.<p>

Not that I was in a bad mood before.

I mean, the evening was really nice.

My foot was throbbing slightly, but it was tolerable and the wound on my stomach barely hurt at all.

And Lupo was exceptionally sweet.

I mean, he usually is, but tonight he was even more so than normal.

I think he felt bad about not wanting to elope.

And I'd teased him about it, but I understood.

He wanted to wait and do it as we planned.

Because he was afraid that I was overreacting to my ordeal.

And maybe I was _reacting_ to it, but I wasn't _over_reacting.

I just wanted to be married to him and I was tired of waiting.

But anyway, the evening was pleasant, and then we headed for home with Mulder in the back seat.

He was chattering away like a kid going on a field trip, and I had to smile at him.

"This is so awesome," he said. "I mean like…this is better than scouting the dinosaur, you know? And that's some cool shit."

I was starting to wonder if he'd ever spent the night away from home.

Not counting the time he'd spent in prison, of course. That had surprised me, but Lupo said it was a minimum security clubhouse, so maybe that was why Mulder was still so…innocent.

He'd called his mom a few minutes ago to let her know that he wouldn't be home.

"_I'm gonna hang with Lupo and his ten," _he'd told her.

It didn't bother me that he referred to me like that. Knowing him, he meant it as the highest form of compliment.

But I did wonder if his mom understood a single word that came out of his mouth.

"_It's work, okay, Ma? Jeez, it's nothing illegal. Lupo's a _cop_." _

He'd rolled his eyes at me while he listened to whatever his mother was saying, and then he said, _"I'm not crashing. They _asked_. I'm gonna write a program for him tomorrow. And then I'm gonna help Carolyn, too…No, Ma, she's not my girlfriend. She's another cop." _

He was quiet for several minutes after the call, but then he perked back up.

"You really think the FBI would hire me?"

"Absolutely. They don't like to advertise that they pick up rogue hackers, but…yeah," Lupo told him. "Carolyn knows a lot of people at the New York field office. If she says she can get you in, then believe it. Although personally, I'd rather have you at the NYPD."

"You just don't want to lose him as a resource," I said. "The Bureau would be a better fit."

"I know," Lupo agreed. He looked in the rearview mirror at Mulder and said, "She's right. I want you at the NYPD for selfish reasons. You sure make investigative work a whole lot easier."

"Hey, man, I'll still creep around in any shit you want, Lupo."

"So you think you might be interested?" I asked him.

I knew he'd be great at it, but considering how little time he spent out of his mother's basement, I was surprised to hear that he seemed to be thinking it over so seriously.

"I'm thinking maybe it's time to fly the coop, right? I mean, _past_ time. I'm a grown man. I shouldn't have to call my mom to tell her I won't be home. I mean, what if I was hooking up with a chica, right? And then I gotta call my mom? Shit, no."

"Do you…hook up with chicas?" Lupo asked with barely masked amusement. I chucked him on the leg, but Mulder didn't seem offended.

"Just 'cos I _haven't_, doesn't mean I _won't_, right?" he replied optimistically. "So yeah, this fibbie thing sounds like some seriously cool shit."

"Let Carolyn know tomorrow," I told him. "I'm sure she'll make the call on Monday."

"Hey, Lupo, will you…you know, like check out the offer? I mean, if they make one. I've never…you know, had a real job before."

"I've got your back," Lupo promised.

It was strange how Mulder had latched onto Lupo, but as far as I was concerned, the dichotomy worked for both of them.

Mulder got guidance from someone he respected, and Lupo got a confidence boost from being admired and emulated.

"So, Bernard and Lauren looked better by the time they left," I commented. "I don't know what Logan said to her, but I guess it worked."

"Yeah," Lupo agreed. "I really need to catch up with Bernard. I have no idea what's going on with them."

"Well, maybe by Mary's housewarming party next weekend, things will have settled down."

"And we'll have caught Carl," he added pointedly.

I'd been purposely avoiding thinking about Carl tonight.

Every time I thought of him, I could literally feel my blood pressure going up.

I hated him.

And yeah, I know he must have something wrong with him mentally, but it didn't change what he'd tried to do to me.

And the terrible things he'd said.

I'd shared some of it with Lupo, but I'd kept the worst of it to myself.

It had taken me a long time to bring him around to the fact that he was the perfect man for me, and I wasn't about to let the ramblings of a delusional jerk like Carl cause a backslide.

But still…I couldn't get Carl's voice out of my head.

_"You know he slept with a murder suspect, right?" _he'd taunted.

_"I know about that,"_ I'd assured him.

_"I read the trial transcript. How…tawdry. And common. And… shameful."_

I hadn't responded to his attempt to bait me, so he kept going.

_"Was that before or after he started sleeping with you?"_

_"Before,"_ I answered firmly. _"Months before. What, you never slept with someone you regretted after the fact?"_

_"No, have you? Other than Lupo, I mean."_

_"I'm not discussing my sexual history with you."_

_"It doesn't matter. After I have you, no one else will exist for you."_

"You okay?" Lupo asked me gently.

I realized that we were now parked across the street from our building and that he'd cut off the car. Mulder was already climbing out of the backseat.

"I'm good," I said, giving him a smile to back up my words.

"I'm sorry I mentioned his name," he said knowingly.

"It's okay," I promised.

He leaned across the seat and kissed me on the cheek and then we both got out of the car.

He came around to my side quickly, looking up and down the street. Despite the fact that he'd been relaxed only moments before, now he was on alert.

Looking for Carl.

All was quiet, so we crossed the street and went into the building.

The elevator was on the fritz, which happens from time to time, so we went up the stairs to our apartment.

My foot was hurting more by the minute, after walking around on it so much, so I was moving slowly, but Lupo and Mulder stayed at my pace.

"I can carry you," Lupo offered.

"Dude, you're so awesome," Mulder commented enthusiastically. "The hero in the movies _always_ carries his girl."

"Except when the girl doesn't want to be carried," I pointed out.

"Even then," Lupo argued as he scooped me up into his arms.

I couldn't stop the squeal of protest that escaped, but Lupo ignored it and carried me up the last two flights of stairs.

"You're going to hurt your back," I insisted.

"From carrying you? I don't think so."

"Up two flights of stairs?"

"To keep you from hurting? I'd carry you anywhere."

"Dude, did you ever see that movie?" Mulder asked, turning to face us as he pushed open the stairwell door with his backside. "You know the one with…"

But that was all he got out.

Because as the door opened, I looked towards Mulder, and past his shoulder, standing in the hallway in front of our apartment door, was Carl.

He appeared to be attempting to pick the lock, but he turned at the sound of the door opening, and then I saw what he had in his other hand.

A gun.

"Lupo!" I screamed.

And what came next all happened so _fast_.

Lupo reacted instantly to my shout, grabbing onto the front of Mulder's shirt with one hand, attempting to pull him back into the stairwell with us, while at the same time, he moved slightly past the doorway and released me so that I was back on my feet.

He firmly shoved me into the corner, keeping me out of Carl's line of sight, and then he took a split second to catch my eye, giving me the unspoken directive to _stay put_.

He still had one hand on Mulder's shirt, tugging hard since momentum had been carrying Mulder into the hall instead of into the stairwell, but he finally started moving in the right direction.

Shots rang out just as the Mulder lurched into the stairwell, and then he went down, flat on his face.

I looked at him in horror, not believing that he'd actually been shot, but it was real and this was happening and he was sprawled in the doorway, and his legs were blocking the door, keeping it from closing, and the small corner where I stood wasn't big enough for two bodies, so Lupo was a sitting duck as he pulled his gun from his holster.

But he's quick, my Lupo.

And all I could think about, as he stood there in the line of fire without batting an eye, was how much Mulder would love to see Lupo like this, standing there like John McClane, facing down the bad guys while protecting the innocent.

Because really, it _was_ just like a movie, only the bullets were real and the blood was real and it was scarier than any movie I've ever seen.

Carl continued firing his gun and bullets were whizzing around the stairwell, ricocheting off the concrete walls and steel railings, but Lupo stood fast and took aim and fired off three shots in quick succession.

And suddenly everything stopped.

My ears were ringing and the stairwell was filled with the smell of gunpowder and I'm pretty sure that I hadn't blinked in the entire thirty seconds that it took for everything to happen.

I stayed still, mostly because I wasn't sure if I was capable of moving, and I stared at Lupo as blood began to seep through the sleeve of his jacket.

"You're shot," I managed to say, and my voice sounded hollow and far away.

"Stay there," he instructed confidently as he cautiously stepped out of the stairwell.

"Lupo…"

"Don't move."

So I didn't.

I waited while he went down the hall, presumably to check on the status of Carl.

I hoped he was dead.

Maybe that makes me a bad person, but I don't care.

I really, _really_ hoped he was dead.

I glanced down at Mulder, who still hadn't moved, and I started to feel sick.

"Mulder?" I asked quietly.

He didn't respond and I saw that there was quite a bit of blood pooling beneath him.

"It's clear," Lupo called out, so I looked around the corner to see him trotting back towards me. "Call 9-1-1."

He dropped to his knees next to Mulder and all I could do was stare.

He was so cool under pressure while I stood frozen.

"Connie," he said sharply. "Call 9-1-1."

And his tone finally pulled me from my trance.

I quickly pulled out my phone as I knelt down on the other side of Mulder. Lupo turned him over and the blood stain on his front side was huge and I faltered briefly when the dispatcher came on the line, but then I swiftly barked out the specifics of our situation and I included Lupo's badge number, hoping that it might make the ambulance move just a little bit faster, and then I dropped my phone and leaned over to see if Mulder was breathing.

Lupo had the kid's shirt ripped open and he was doing what he could to slow the blood flow.

"Is he breathing?"

"Yes," I answered. "Barely."

I felt for a pulse, and it was there when I first put my fingers against his throat, but as I kept my fingers in place, trying to assess his heart rate, it stopped.

"Lupo," I said, my voice cracking as the fear rolled through me that he might actually die. "He's not breathing anymore."

Lupo whipped off his jacket and covered the exit wound on Mulder's stomach.

"Hold this here," he ordered, taking my hand and setting it on top of his jacket.

So I used my hands that didn't want to stop shaking to hold pressure on the wound, trying to control the blood that continued to pour out, while Lupo gave him CPR.

"Call…um…call Bernard," Lupo said as he continued to thrust his hands down on Mulder's chest. His voice was ragged, and it was the first sign of real emotion that I'd seen from him since this whole thing started.

I'd tossed my phone down after calling 9-1-1, so I glanced back to see where it had landed, and then I reached out with one hand to get it while keeping the other hand in place.

As I turned back around, I noticed that Lupo's shirt sleeve was completely soaked in blood, and the fabric near his elbow was torn.

"Switch," I told him as I finally found my inner strength.

"What?"

"Your arm."

"It's nothing."

But I moved him out of the way and took over chest compressions so that he could hold pressure on the wound and make the call.

So Lupo talked to Bernard.

The purpose of the call was likely only for support because the cops were coming and so was an ambulance and Carl was dead.

But Bernard was his best friend and Lupo was clearly more rattled than he was letting on, so I was grateful that he'd allowed himself the luxury of reaching out. It wasn't something he normally did.

And while he did that, I continued to alternately breathe and force the heartbeat for Mulder, who so far was completely unresponsive.

So I didn't just do that.

I also prayed.

TBC...


	56. Chapter 56

**Bobby POV**

* * *

><p>"What are you thinking?"<p>

"I don't see him out late. And I definitely don't see him staying out this late without keeping Ross in the loop."

"Uh huh," Alex agreed as she turned the car down Ross' street. "According to Liz, he's been on the straight and narrow all week."

"Except for yesterday when he ditched them in Baltimore."

"Well, yeah, there's that."

"And he left them so that he could confront Kelly's killer."

"Who's now supposedly dead. You think he remembered the other person involved?"

"Maybe. And since the cops think the case is closed, maybe he thought he needed to get proof."

"So how do you want to play this?"

"Let's just take a look around first, and see if Jeremy's made any more contact."

She parked the car directly in front of the house and shut off the engine.

Liz was standing out on the porch, presumably waiting for us.

"Thank you for coming," she said immediately, walking down the sidewalk to meet us halfway. "I know Danny thinks that I'm jumping the gun, but…"

"I don't think that," Ross said as he came out of the house.

He was holding two cups of coffee, one of which he gave to Liz and the other he offered to Alex.

When she declined, he held it out to me, but I turned it down, too, because despite the late hour, I was wired.

We both were.

After so many years on the job, late night calls were the same as the alarm clock.

It just meant it was time to work.

"Tell us everything you know," I said to Ross as he slid an arm around Liz's shoulder.

The two of them stood together, holding coffee cups but not drinking from them, and I had a hard time remembering that I was looking at the chief of D's and a medical examiner because right now they just looked like worried parents.

"We were supposed to have dinner tonight, but Jeremy sent me a text message around five-thirty that stated he'd met up with a friend from high school, and that they were going to hang out tonight."

"Hang out? That was what he said?"

"Yeah. But then he didn't text again all evening."

"Danny checked on him while we were at Steve-O's, but Jeremy didn't respond, so he sent another one when we were on the way home."

"And that time he responded?"

"Uh huh," Ross said with a nod as he let go of Liz long enough to retrieve his phone. He read the message aloud. "_Sorry – I didn't hear it buzz the first time. I'm having a good time, and behaving myself so don't worry. It's Friday. You and your wife should go out and have some fun."_

"And that's what clued you in?" Alex asked Liz.

"He wouldn't have said _your wife_. He would've said Liz. That's all he ever calls me."

"Did he use correct grammar and spelling when texting?" I asked, holding out my hand for the phone so that I could look at the message myself.

"Yes."

"Does he normally?"

"With me, yes," Ross answered. "I don't know what he does when he's texting friends."

"He does with me, too," Liz said. "I told him there's no reason to get in bad habits."

"Okay, so aside from not calling you by name, it seems like something he would send."

"Yeah," Liz admitted. "I know, it seems crazy, but…"

"But he's still not here," Ross said. "And we haven't heard from him again."

"Okay," I said, catching Alex's eye. "Well, we'd like to take a look around inside, if that's alright. Maybe look in Jeremy's room."

So we went inside and wandered through our boss' house.

It felt a little odd, even though Alex and I had both been here socially on many occasions.

Because this time, we were analyzing and inspecting every little detail.

"I swear, I don't think he's been in here at all since this morning," Liz said as I poked around in the kitchen. I took note of the dishes, rinsed and turned upside down on the rack in the sink. There were three coffee cups, a bowl, and two spoons.

"Because he didn't eat after breakfast," I remarked. "Maybe he stopped somewhere on the way home from Skoda's appointment."

"Even so…he's nineteen. He eats almost hourly," she said with a rueful smile. "I gave him a hard time about it, saying how I was going to have to start grocery shopping more often."

She was trying to stay calm, I could tell, but she was having trouble.

"He knew you were teasing," Ross assured her.

"Yeah, but I shouldn't have said it. I should've been making him feel like he was at home."

"You did. You teasing…that's natural."

She shook her head and looked at the ceiling for a moment and then took a deep breath and brought her eyes back to mine.

"Okay, so I think if he'd come home, he would've eaten something. And there'd be evidence of it."

"Which means he's been gone for more than ten hours," Alex said. "Baltimore? Maybe Skoda's session sparked more memories?"

"Maybe," Ross answered. "But I don't picture him not admitting it. When he went off on his own yesterday, he at least sent a message telling us not to worry."

"Danny's right," Liz said. "He feels bad about everything that's happened, and not just for what he's going through, but for what he thinks he's putting us through."

"Okay," I said thoughtfully. "Okay, so let's see his room."

Alex and I followed Liz up the stairs to what was previously one of the guest bedrooms. It didn't escape my notice that Ross had purchased a three-bedroom, even though at the time he was a bachelor. He still wanted to have rooms for his boys.

"He left his laptop," Alex commented, walking over to the desk near the window. She shook the mouse and the unit came to life. "Psychology study guide. And a Facebook page. Gmail."

"I already looked at that," Ross told us. "There's no activity since this morning."

"What do you think about this?" she asked him, pointing to another open window. "He was googling dream analysis."

"He told me that he kept dreaming about last Friday night."

"Uh huh," I said as I walked around the bed and started pulling open the nightstand drawers. "He told us that, too. And Alex suggested he try writing down his dreams as soon as he woke up. But I don't see a notebook."

"He's gen-y," Alex said. "I doubt he uses pen and paper. He probably kept it in a DOCX."

She fiddled with the computer while I continued my perusal of the room. He hadn't personalized it much yet, but there probably hadn't been time.

Or was he not planning on staying long?

He seemed to like being here, and I knew that he respected his father, and he had a real fondness for Liz, so it was hard to say.

He was also trying to be independent and make his own way.

Had he gone to Baltimore, like Alex suggested?

Or had Baltimore come to him?

Because if we were right, and there was another perpetrator, then right now, Jeremy was the only other person alive who knew the truth.

"Let's leave them alone to do their job," Liz suggested, taking Ross' hand and guiding him out of the room.

"Bobby," Alex said quietly.

I quickly went over to where she sat in front of the computer and read the Word file over her shoulder.

There were a couple of pages worth, mostly random thoughts and a lot of unanswered questions.

_How could I let that happen? I was right there, but I didn't do anything. How long did it take? How long did she cry for me? I wonder if she hated me by the time she died. How could she not? I was supposed to protect her._

"He needs more sessions with Skoda," she said sadly. "He's completely blaming himself."

"He loved her. He was in the room with her when she died. I can't imagine…"

I put my hand on her shoulder as I leaned in closer to continue reading. It was more of the same, with flashes of recovered memories peppered in.

The last entry was from this morning.

_I don't know what to think about it. I dreamed that I slept with Cierra, of all people. It's weird, because I've never thought about her like that, but it felt so real…and now that I'm awake, I feel like I really need a shower. Because I feel dirty and guilty, like I was cheating. I have to keep reminding myself that it wasn't real, but I can see her face so clearly in my mind that it feels like an actual memory. But I never cheated on Kelly. I've never cheated on any girl, ever, because then I'd be just like my mother and that's the last thing in the world I want to do. But it still bugs me because Cierra's got these creepy long fingernails and I'd swear that I could feel them on me. _

"I'm with him," Alex mumbled. "This is starting to creep me out. So…Cierra. I know we looked at her, but…I don't know, Bobby. I can see her as the type to play sexual games and mess with his mind, but to kill a classmate?"

"Two people in the room…Cierra and Kenny were cozied up in the library that day…is it a stretch to think they pulled this off together?"

"And then she killed Kenny," Alex said with a nod. "Because he didn't have the stones for it?"

"Or because it's not what he wanted in the first place. When we saw them, he looked pretty pissed."

"True, but then why didn't he come clean with us?"

"Because he had sex with her. He knew he was partly responsible, even if he isn't the one who killed her."

"We've interviewed professional killers with more tells," she said with a shake of her head. "How did two college kids get so soulless?"

"They're driven by hormones. And one-upmanship," I replied. "Kelly had what Cierra wanted, so she drafted Kenny's help by telling him she'd get Kelly to sleep with him, and then she altered the plan at the last minute and killed Kelly instead."

"So do you think that Jeremy's dream was reality? And he was so high that he doesn't remember having sex with Cierra?"

"Or Cierra talked about it so much that it's lodged in his brain," I suggested. "His mind is a mess right now, and I don't think it would take much to alter his perception of reality."

"Well, either way, we need to find out where she's at. She may or may not be the reason for his disappearance tonight, but if we're right, and she's the killer…"

"Then she's persuaded him to go with her."

"Or she forced him."

"She?" Ross asked, having come to stand in the doorway.

"We need to call down to Johns Hopkins campus security," Alex said. "I want them to find out where Cierra Bingham is."

"Cierra? The girl who has a crush on Jeremy?" Liz asked. "You questioned her already, didn't you?"

"Twice," Alex said with a nod. "And we passed her name on to the Baltimore police, but I think they were more focused on Kenny, and after he killed himself…"

"Which was convenient for her," Ross said with a nod. "So you think she killed Kelly and Kenny?"

"Maybe. We're working on theory here," I admitted. "But I don't like how her name keeps popping up, and Jeremy's been dreaming about her, even though he doesn't like her."

"You think she came up here," Liz stated with forced calm. "And that she has Jeremy. Do you think she…she…"

"She wouldn't kill him," Alex said.

"How can you know that?"

"Because she would've done it here," I answered. "She would've made his death look like a suicide, too. The house was empty…the fallen son of the chief of D's…no one would've questioned it."

"Fallen son," Ross said roughly.

"I'm saying how she would've made it look," I explained quickly. "And Jeremy does feel guilt for dragging you into his mess. Some of his own notes show signs of depression, so she could've just added one more…"

"Okay," he interrupted, clearly not wanting to go down that path.

And I didn't blame him at all.

"So if she doesn't want to kill him, then what is she doing with him?"

"Let's find out if we're right before we start speculating," Alex said as she dialed her phone. "Yes, this is Detective Goren with the NYPD. I was in your office earlier this week in conjunction with a murder investigation…that's right. Yes, I need you to send someone to the Eastway dorm to check on Cierra Bingham…I know it's after midnight…did you hear me say that this is a murder investigation? It's also a potential kidnapping, so get off your _ass_ and go get a visual on the suspect…okay."

She hung up and caught my eye and said, "He'll call me back in ten minutes."

"Jeremy told us Thursday night that Cierra had borrowed another girl's car. He said she wasn't on campus the night Kenny was killed," Ross supplied.

"Maybe she borrowed the car as an alibi," Alex offered. "Let's wait and see what campus security says."

It was a long ten minutes as the four of us pondered the possibilities of where else he might be.

I mean, we didn't really have any solid evidence on which to base our theory.

We could be wrong.

Was Cierra really the type to do something like this?

I considered her to be aggressive, with her shameless and blatant interest in me and older men in general, but was it all an act just to throw us off the scent?

And I guess it worked.

We'd looked at her, but my internal alarm hadn't gone off. I just thought she was a spoiled college kid who was used to getting whatever she wanted.

And maybe she was.

She wanted Jeremy, and so she'd gotten him by any means necessary.

Alex's phone rang and she answered on the first ring, putting her phone on speaker.

"Well?"

"She's not in her room."

"And?"

"And she missed both of her classes today."

"Is that it?"

"No. Her suitemate said that she borrowed her car on Thursday. A black 2009 BMW."

Ross nodded solemnly at the news, but didn't say anything.

"Put out a campus-wide alert. If she's spotted, we need to know immediately. And we need everything you've got on her…financials, family information…everything," she instructed him while at the same time, I pulled out my phone and called dispatch.

Five minutes later, we had an APB out on the vehicle and BOLO's on both Jeremy and Cierra.

"I should've called you two hours ago," Ross said, the worry etched on his face. "If something happens to him…"

He trailed off his statement when Alex's phone buzzed.

"Bobby," Alex said as she looked at the message. "Look at this."

I stepped closer to her and read the display. It was Cierra's personal information from campus security.

"Her FAFSA record shows property in the Hamptons."

"Let's go check it out."

TBC...


	57. Chapter 57

**Bernard POV**

* * *

><p>"He made his move, B."<p>

I didn't have to ask who he was talking about.

Even if Carl wasn't foremost on everyone's mind, my partner's tone of voice would've clued me in.

Forced calm barely masking extreme distress.

"Connie?"

"She's safe. Mulder got shot. And Carl's dead."

"Mulder?"

"Hanging on by a thread," he answered, and his voice sounded even more ragged.

"Where are you?"

"Home. We were just getting home, and he was here…"

"I'll be right there. Have you called 9-1-1?"

"Yeah."

"Don't let the cops touch anything," I said firmly. "You hear me, Lupes? Let the EMT's take care of Mulder, but nothing else gets touched."

I slammed my phone closed and turned to find Lauren holding out my jacket for me.

She'd already put on her shoes and coat and had keys in her hand.

For the past hour, we'd been sitting together on the couch, mostly talking, but it had evolved into a little bit of making out.

Okay, so maybe more than a little bit.

If the phone call had come in ten minutes later, I would've needed to put on more than my jacket.

And that hadn't been my intention.

To move things along so quickly with her.

_Again_, I mean.

I thought that this time, after the events of the past two days, we should slow it down. I wanted her to know that I care about her for who she is.

But apparently her concerns were different than mine.

She was afraid that after learning about what happened, that I wouldn't find her physically attractive anymore.

We were approaching the situation from two completely different perspectives and it almost derailed us again.

"_I'm not in any hurry,"_ I'd said to her as I captured her hand in mine in an effort to keep her from unbuckling my belt.

But instead of slowing down, she stopped completely, moving away from me on the couch and putting some distance between us.

"_Right. I'm sorry. I know it's probably hard for you now."_

"_What? What's hard for me?"_

And I had a dirty joke on the tip of my tongue, but she clearly wasn't in a joking kind of mood, so I stifled it and instead waited for her response.

"_To want me…sexually. I mean, after…"_

"_That's not it at all,"_ I said quickly. "_I just don't want you to think that's all I want."_

"_Yeah, but…"_

"_No buts," _I interrupted. _"I want you every bit as much as I did before. Maybe even more so because I feel closer to you than before. I've been trying to tell you that for two days now."_

"_You're a nice guy, B.,"_ she said, almost as if that was a bad thing. "_Of course you're going to say that."_

"_So now you're going to call me a liar, too?"_

"_I didn't mean that."_

"_But you think I'm lying."_

She let out a sigh and turned to look at me, but she didn't say anything.

"_Let's get something straight,"_ I said firmly while at the same time I reached out to gently touch her on the cheek. _"I might be an asshole from time to time, so you were right to call me that earlier today, but I don't lie. And for you to try to say that I'm just being nice? Well, that just pisses me off. We're past that. And maybe it's awkward right now because you've got your hang-ups and I've got mine, but we'll get through it."_

"_Okay...so...let's talk about it. What's your hang-up?"_ she asked after a moment. Her voice was soft and she scooted closer to me and reached out to take hold of my hand.

"_My hang-up? It's that you think I don't see you as the same beautiful woman that I met three weeks ago. I want you to know that I do and that I really care about you, and that it has nothing to do with sex."_

"_You want to know mine?"_ she asked and when I nodded, she continued. "_I just want us to go back to being like we were before I let this whole mess get to me."_

"_And you think I don't find you sexually attractive anymore," _I added_._

"_The thought crossed my mind. And then when you didn't want to move things forward…"_

"_I want to,"_ I interjected. "_Lauren, I've never wanted anyone as much as I want you. I just wasn't sure if it was the right thing to do. For _you_."_

She kissed me, chastely at first and then with increased enthusiasm. After a minute, she pulled back and looked at me.

"_We had a fight. And the best part about a fight is the make-up sex, right? Are you really going to deny me that pleasure?"_

"_I don't want to deny you anything_," I replied as my resolve dissipated. _"I was just trying to…"_

"_I know. Do what's right for me,"_ she supplied with smile. "_And I appreciate that, I really do. But why don't you ask _me_ what's right for me?"_

"_Okay,"_ I agreed amenably. _"Tell me."_

She eased over onto my lap and cast me a glance that was somehow cocky and shy at the same time. Like she wanted to be sure of my answer but at the same time she had her doubts.

And then she said softly, "_I want to make love with you."_

Now, I have willpower.

But there was no way in the world I could resist her request.

And maybe she had a point in that I was only guessing at what would be best for her. If she wanted physical proof of how much I want her sexually then I was going to show her.

Or at least, I _was_.

But she'd started kissing me again, and then she'd pulled off my tie in a slow deliberate manner that had me gripping the couch cushions in an effort to curtail my need to take over control, and then the phone rang.

"_I need to get it,"_ I managed to say, even though answering the phone was the last thing in the world I wanted to do at the moment.

But it was late.

And my cell phone didn't ring late for no reason.

"_I know,"_ she agreed as she moved off of my lap.

And of course, it was Lupo.

After talking with him, Lauren and I tabled our make-up sex and instead ran out of the apartment.

"Where are they?" she asked as we left the apartment in hurry.

"Lupo's. You drive."

Because I couldn't.

Lupo doesn't shake easily, and he sounded worse than I'd ever heard him.

Lauren flipped on the siren and threw the cherry on top and managed to make the twenty-minute drive in just over ten.

We got upstairs and found a circus.

The EMT's were there, working on Mulder, and they were talking crisply to each other, saying things like _we need to get his pressure up first_ and _he's going to bleed out if we don't scoop and run._

The cops were there, too.

We'd passed one uniform on our way in. He'd been spreading the yellow tape across the third floor landing, but I'd badged him and bulled my way through without waiting for approval.

There was another cop up on Lupo's floor, out in the hallway. He was all the way at the end. He had Connie and Lupo on separate sides of the hall, and he was standing between them like he was guarding them as suspects.

And then there was Carl, dead on the floor just outside of Lupo's apartment door. There was a lock pick tool still in the deadbolt and a quick glance told me that he'd taken three to the chest.

"Lupes," I said as I pushed my way past the self-appointed guard. "What the hell happened?"

"Hey, back off," the cop said.

"I'm his partner."

"And I'm under orders from IAB, so you need to take a step back."

"Who called IAB already?"

"I did. It's standard procedure in an officer-involved shooting."

"It's okay, B.," Lupo said, and I stopped glaring at the officer long enough to take in the sight of my partner.

The bottom half of his shirt sleeve was completely red.

"Did you let him get medical attention?" I asked sharply.

"The paramedics are kind of busy right now."

"So that's a no," I said. I glanced back in the direction of the EMT's and saw that they were getting ready to move Mulder.

"Lauren, grab some gauze from their kit."

The words were barely out of my mouth before she trotted back down the hall to snag the supplies.

"You know he's a Major Case detective, right?" I chastised the cop. "He came home to find his wife's stalker trying to break into their apartment."

"Detective," the cop interrupted firmly. "Don't talk about what happened until we can get his official statement."

"I've got eyes. I don't need his statement. Do you? Did you see the lock pick in the door? Did you notice the position of the other gunshot victim? Did you learn _anything_ at the academy?" I questioned sharply. "Now you can either help me or stay the hell out of the way."

I motioned for Connie to join me and then I told Lupo to sit on the floor. He was looking pale and he'd been leaning heavily against the wall.

"I'm fine," he insisted.

"I'm not asking," I fired back. "Get his shirt off, Connie."

"Here," Lauren said, having come back with the gauze.

"How did Mulder look?" Lupo asked her.

"He was breathing, but it's hard to say. They're taking him to Bellevue."

"Alone," Connie pointed out, obviously distraught. "This happened because of me. Lauren, can you…"

Lauren looked at me questioningly and I nodded, so she immediately took off down the hall so that she could catch up to the EMT's and ride along with Mulder.

"This isn't your fault, Connie. You know that," I remarked as I knelt down in front of Lupo. Connie had gotten his shirt off and I saw that what was in his arm was actually shrapnel.

"What the hell," I mumbled, trying to figure out exactly what it was. He stiffened when I tugged on it experimentally. It was lodged in his forearm, almost at the crease of his elbow, and I mean it was _in_ there.

"What is it?" Connie asked, moving closer to get a better look at it.

"It's the strike plate," I answered as I finally was able to identify it. I looked back down the hall toward the stairwell door, but we were too far away to see such a detail.

"From the doorway?"

"That's what it looks like. Carl's shot must've hit it, sending it flying into his arm."

"Well, a bullet would be so ordinary," Lupo joked through clenched teeth.

"There you go, officer," I said looking back over my shoulder. "You know he was standing in the stairwell because he's got part of the doorway in his arm."

"So?"

"And the DOA had a lock pick in the deadbolt. Are you seriously telling me you can't see how Detective Lupo walked in on a break-in?"

"He fired three shots at the guy's chest."

"All of which look lethal to me, so if the victim didn't shoot first, how the hell did my partner get shrapnel in his arm? Not to mention our friend is on his way to the hospital after getting shot in the back, so tell me again who was the aggressor in this situation?"

The officer just stared at me blankly and I turned my back on him in annoyance as I muttered, "We'll wait for IAB."

I inspected Lupo's arm again and decided that the bleeding had slowed to an ooze, so for now, it should just be covered. Once IAB was done with him, he'd have to go to the hospital and have it removed, but it wasn't hurting anything to stay embedded for the time being.

Connie sat on the floor next to Lupo, holding tightly onto his hand, and I noticed that she looked nearly as pale as he did.

"You okay, Connie?"

"I've had better days," she said, slowly bringing her eyes to mine. Then she looked past me to where Carl lay. "Although it hasn't been all bad."

"Mulder will be fine," I said, even though I had no way of knowing whether or not that was true.

"You called her my wife," Lupo said once I had the gauze in place.

"What?"

"When you were explaining what happened. You called her my wife."

I hadn't realized that I'd done so, but as I thought back over my words, I realized he was right. Although, I thought of her as such anyway, so it didn't really matter.

"So?"

"Not until August."

"Really? Because I'm wondering how things will be different then than they are now."

They looked at each other and both shrugged.

"She's your wife, Lupes. If that scares you, then maybe you should've thought of that before you jumped her on the first date."

"You told him about that?" Connie asked, and I was glad to see that my comment had both of them smiling.

"I…um…"

"And you said you jumped me? Because you know that's not true. It was definitely the other way around."

"Officer, I thought I told you to keep the parties separated!"

I looked up to see that IAB had arrived on the scene, so I stood up and turned to face them.

One of them I knew, and the other one I didn't, but the unknown one stayed quiet and let his partner do the talking.

"Bernard," Horsley said in surprise. "I didn't know you were involved."

"My partner, Detective Lupo, is the one who did the shooting," I clarified. "The DOA is a stalker who finally snapped and kidnapped ADA Rubirosa, Lupo's fiancé. She escaped, but when they arrived home tonight, the suspect was attempting to break into their home."

"You want to write the report for him, Bernard, or can I talk to Lupo myself?" Horsley said with a wry grin.

He was a decent guy.

I'd heard about how IAB had attempted to railroad Goren last winter, but the orders had come from higher up and in the end, Horsley had done the right thing.

"I just don't want IAB to jam up a good cop," I stated. "And he needs to get medical attention. He's got part of the stairwell doorway in his arm. Not to mention the fact that our friend is currently in critical condition as a result of the shooting, and we'd like to get to the hospital."

"Give me ten minutes with him and we can clear this up," Horsley agreed, so I stepped aside as the younger IAB guy guided Connie down the hall to get her statement and Horsley knelt down next to Lupo to take his.

I kept an ear on both of the conversations while I pulled out my phone and sent Lauren a text.

_**Mulder?**_

She replied after only a minute.

_**Just pulling up now, but they lost him twice on the way here. It doesn't look good.**_

TBC...


	58. Chapter 58

**Ross POV**

* * *

><p>Bobby and Alex had been gone for twenty minutes when I got the call.<p>

The caller didn't ask for Chief Ross.

Or even Danny Ross.

Instead, the faceless voice on the other end of the line asked, "Are you the father of Jeremy Ross?"

And my heart dropped.

I didn't want to answer because I didn't want to hear what came next.

This was not the kind of call that any parent ever wants to receive.

"Who is it?" Liz asked softly but urgently, and I turned my eyes to hers, still speechless as the caller repeated the question.

"I…I…yes," I said at last.

"I'm calling from the emergency room at Southside."

"What happened? Is Jeremy okay?"

"He was brought in about thirty minutes ago, non-responsive from an apparent overdose. The doctor was able to stabilize him. I found your number in his cell phone. Is there someone else I should call?"

"No. We'll be there as soon as we can. Is he awake?"

"Not yet, but he should be coming around soon."

I hung up and looked at Liz, who was nearly in tears just from my side of the conversation.

"He's at Southside. He OD'd," I told her, and I was conflicted between feeling anger and fear.

What the hell had he been thinking?

"I don't believe it."

"Believe it, Liz," I said as I grabbed the keys and the two of us headed for the door. "I should've put the damn kid under house arrest. I tried to show him a little bit of trust and this is the thanks I get."

And maybe it sounds like I'm blaming him, but I was blaming myself even more.

He had _problems_.

Bobby and Alex said that he was depressed, and I shouldn't have even needed them to tell me that.

I should know what the hell is going on with my own son.

But clearly I didn't.

I was a failure as a father…

"Danny," she began.

"I know you're not going to try to make excuses for him," I interrupted. "For God's sake, Liz, the ER says he came in non-responsive."

"Came in _how_?"

"I…don't know," I admitted, coming to a halt on the sidewalk.

"Exactly. You _don't_ know," she replied firmly, telling me in no uncertain terms that I was being an ass.

"You're right. Again."

"I'm not saying he didn't backslide. I'm saying let's find out from him. And call Bobby to let him know that we've found him."

Liz, having regained her composure, took the keys from my hand and marched around to the driver's side.

She was quiet as she started the engine, but I could feel her annoyance with me.

And her fear for Jeremy.

I pulled out my phone to call Bobby, but then I paused and looked over at her.

"I don't want to be one of those parents who's blind to their kid's problems."

"You don't always get to protect yourself," she said. "It doesn't always work like that. You've put stock in Jeremy. You raised him well, and this past week you've been a tremendous help to him. So it's okay to put your foot down and say_ I know my son didn't do this_."

"But what if he did?"

"Do you think he did? Honestly? Do you really think he went out tonight, and not only took drugs, but took so many that he ended up in the hospital?"

"No."

"Then don't try to pre-empt being wrong. If somehow on the off-chance that he _did_ do this, then no one's going to fault you for standing behind him. In fact, that's exactly where you should be. And you should sure as hell be there now, before we've heard the facts."

I leaned my head back against the seat and closed my eyes as I pinched the bridge of my nose between my fingers.

"What happened to the days when he was a kid and my biggest problem was his latest crush?"

"You mean Alex?"

"What?" I asked, whipping my head around to look at my wife. She had a small smile on her face.

"You didn't know that?"

"No," I admitted, and my initial amusement faded. "I guess it's not just lately that I don't know him, huh?"

"You know him," she said firmly. "So don't quit on him now. Cierra has something to do with this, I know it."

And she may very well have a point.

I mean, Bobby and Alex suspected her of giving Kenny the lethal dose of ketamine.

Or at the very least, they suspected _someone_ of doing it as opposed to Kenny himself, and the fact that drugs were an integral part of this case and now Jeremy had OD'd…well, it had to mean something.

The nurse hadn't said what he'd OD'd on.

That thought brought about a fresh round of panic as I considered what long-term affects he might have from this incident.

She'd said they expected him to wake up soon, and so my initial fears were put to rest, but wake up in what condition?

"Call Bobby," Liz reminded me.

My phone was still in my hand, so I dutifully dialed Bobby's number.

"Goren."

"Jeremy's at Southside ER," I told him.

"Is he alright?" he asked worriedly.

"He OD'd. On what, I'm not sure. I'm hoping he'll be awake by the time we get there."

"No one came in with him?"

"No, the nurse had to go through his cell phone to get my number."

"Interesting that Southside is about halfway between your house and the Hamptons."

No condemnation of Jeremy on drugs.

No _I knew it_ or _I told you so_.

He'd immediately jumped to the same conclusion as Liz and was looking in the direction of Cierra.

As if I needed to feel worse about myself than I already did.

Maybe failure wasn't a strong enough word.

"You think Cierra's involved," I stated.

"I'm not sure, but I definitely still want to talk to her. I mean, don't you think it's odd that he just appeared in an ER?"

"Well, yeah, I guess so."

"You think he attempted suicide," Bobby commented. "Chief, I didn't mean to put that thought in your head. All I was saying was that with recent events, it might be something easy for Cierra to set up. Just like I think she set it up for Kenny."

"I know."

"We're still going to check out Cierra's family's house in the Hamptons. I want to find out what that girl's been up to. Keep me posted on Jeremy's status, okay?"

So I hung up with Bobby and stared out the window, thinking about Jeremy.

Liz was right.

He'd made so much progress this week, and he felt so much guilt over what had happened with Kelly.

He wouldn't have just gone out and started doing drugs again.

"It's still another half hour," Liz commented after several more miles. "Call and get another update. And get them to tell you what he had in his system."

Ten minutes later, I had more answers.

One, Jeremy was awake.

Two, his drug screen showed cocaine and he had a BAC of .14.

And three, he supposedly had no recollection of the past twenty-four hours.

"It's last Friday night all over again," I said to Liz after I passed on the information.

"Cocaine," she said uncertainly. "He never once mentioned cocaine."

"No, he hasn't," I agreed. "What would show on a standard ER drug screen?"

"Um…amphetamines, barbiturates, benzodiazepines…"

"Ketamine?"

"No."

"Let's get them to run it as soon as we get there. Because as far as I know, no one ever had memory loss from cocaine."

By the time we got to the hospital, I had several scenarios worked out in my head, but none of them had Jeremy willingly doing cocaine.

Because I trusted him.

And if I found out later that I was wrong, then I'd just be one more parent that uninvolved parties would shake their heads at.

But I didn't think I was wrong.

Unfortunately, Liz doesn't have privileges at Southside, but that didn't stop her from running roughshod over the ER staff.

"You didn't question his lack of memory?" she asked the doctor after we spent a few minutes talking with Jeremy.

He looked like hell, but he seemed fully aware of his current surroundings, and he seemed really glad to see us.

And really upset about us seeing him in his present condition.

"Or how he managed to end up in your ER despite the fact that he was passed out cold?" Liz continued.

"I'm attributing his memory loss to the excessive amount of alcohol," the doctor replied condescendingly. His tone went over like a lead balloon.

"That would be great, if he was only forgetting the past few hours. He can't even remember getting out of bed this morning. You think he was drunk then, Doctor? Because I can assure you that he wasn't."

"What is it that you expect me to do, Doctor?" the ER doc replied, his voice dripping with sarcasm at the use of her title.

"Run a full tox report," she said firmly.

While she continued to rail at the doctor, I looked back at my son.

"How are you holding up?"

"I don't know what happened, Dad. I heard the nurse say that I tested positive for cocaine, but I don't do that stuff. You have to know that."

"I do."

"And I wasn't drinking."

"Your BAC was 1.4."

"I don't know how to explain it. But I'm busted, so why would I lie?"

"You wouldn't. What do you remember about Cierra?"

"Um…I don't know. I haven't seen her since last Friday. At least…I don't think so."

"You sent me a text this afternoon and told me that you were going to hang out with a buddy from high school."

"I did? Did I say who?"

"No. There was nothing on your Facebook page about it. I'm going to look through your cell phone, if that's okay with you. I want to see if anyone texted you."

And yeah, I was going to do it anyway so that we could get to the bottom of this, but I wanted to see his reaction.

It was immediate and open.

"Yeah, sure. I guess it's…wherever my clothes are. I had it in my jeans pocket."

I nodded and wandered over to the counter that held the plastic bag filled with his personal items.

"Do you remember your session with Dr. Skoda?" I asked.

"The shrink? I know you said you were going to get me an appointment, but…did I talk to him already?"

This was bad.

I found the cell where the nurse had returned it after getting my number, and I scrolled through today's text messages.

There were ones from me and Liz and a couple from Aaron, but that was it.

The outgoing messages were about the same.

Me, Liz, and Aaron.

So no high school buddy.

In fact, no buddies at all, which made me sad for him.

What kind of kid his age had no one text messaging him?

"Anything?" he asked hopefully.

"No, nothing."

"We'll piece it together," Liz told him comfortingly now that she'd finished yelling at the doctor. She sat down on the edge of the bed and ruffled his hair. "How're you feeling?"

"You know how last weekend I said I had the hangover from hell? This is worse."

We talked for several more minutes, trying to see how far back his memory loss went.

Apparently, just about twenty-four hours.

"Dr. Rodgers?" the nurse said, poking her head around the curtain that isolated Jeremy's bed from the others in the ER.

"What is it?"

The nurse motioned for her to join her in the hall, so I took over her spot on the side of the bed.

Jeremy looked at me like he wanted to say something, but then he closed his eyes, leaning back into the pillow.

"What?" I asked him.

"Dad's, it's…God, why is this happening to me?"

"I don't know, but it is, so let's work together and figure it out, okay? You want to be a cop? Consider this practice. Deal in facts, okay?"

"Okay," he said with a nod. "Okay, well, I think I had sex tonight."

It was about the last thing in the world I expected him to say, but I hid my surprise and instead asked, "You remember that but nothing else?"

"No, I don't remember it. But I mean, I can _tell_, you know? Or at least, I think so," he said, then he sighed heavily and added, "Or maybe not. I just don't know, but it's a feeling, you know?"

I nodded at him thoughtfully, but before I could respond, Liz came back into the curtain area.

"Rohypnol," she stated.

"The date rape drug?" Jeremy asked, looking at me with concern.

"You actually had quite a bit of it in your system, which can cause memory loss, loss of consciousness…"

"This is great," he mumbled.

"That's not all," Liz continued.

"What else?" I asked.

"Sildenafil citrate."

"Which is what?"

She glanced at me and then back at Jeremy.

"Viagra."

TBC...


	59. Chapter 59

**Alex POV**

* * *

><p>"I knew I didn't like this girl from the first time I talked to her."<p>

"Why not?"

"Because she was eyeballing you. She called you a silver fox."

"Doesn't that insinuate that I'm old?" Bobby asked me with a pained expression on his face.

"Yeah, well, it also means you're smoking hot. Which you are, by the way," I said with a grin. And then I added, "As for the age, well...she's nineteen, so it's all relative."

"I'm older than you, too."

"Only by a few years."

"So you don't think I'm a silver fox?"

I rolled my eyes at him and shook my head.

"You're not old, Bobby. Are you kidding me? After that performance earlier tonight?"

"It was pretty good."

"Uh uh. Unparalleled, remember?"

He smiled at me and then opened up his notebook.

"So if Cierra really is responsible for Jeremy's ten-hour disappearance, then why let him go?" he posed.

"You mean instead of killing him? I think she loves him."

"So what was this whole exercise about?"

"I don't know. She wants him to come around to her way of thinking? Or she wanted to see what he remembered?"

"So she quizzed him and then doped him up and dropped him at the ER?"

"I'm not saying it makes sense," I admitted. "But I'll be curious to hear her story."

"She might not be here. Just because she's not in Baltimore…"

"Call it a hunch," I said. "She's here."

It took us nearly two hours to make the trek out to Wainscott. By the time we arrived in the Bingham's summer home neighborhood, we'd gotten another call about Jeremy, this time from Liz.

"Rohypnol, cocaine, grain alcohol, and Viagra," she said through clenched teeth. "It's a miracle she didn't kill him."

"So he has no recollection of what happened?"

"He doesn't even remember breakfast. Alex…"

Her voice broke and I felt a wave of protectiveness roll through me.

"We're almost to her house now. If she's involved, we'll get her."

"I know you will."

"Are they releasing him?"

"Soon. Danny called Dr. Skoda to get his opinion on what to do next, and so he's going to meet us at the house. He wanted to talk to him tonight."

"That's good. How's the boss holding up?"

"Just as he should. Jeremy, too."

"And you?"

"I'll be a lot happier when you've got that sociopath in custody."

"That makes two of us. I'll keep you posted."

"Okay," I said to Bobby after I hung up. "So apparently she didn't just quiz him and dope him up."

"What do you mean?"

"He had Viagra in his system."

Bobby stared at me thoughtfully as I slowed the car to a reasonable speed and turned off the lights and siren. The Bingham home was three streets to the east, and I didn't want her to get a warning of our arrival.

"What are you thinking?"

"Sociopath," he said, unknowingly mimicking Liz's assessment, although hers was surely spoken out of emotion rather than as a diagnosis. "But it's rare in women. Men are three times more likely to display sociopathic behavior."

"But she fits the parameters."

"Uh huh. She's charming."

"If you can call it that," I muttered.

"She seems to have a lot of friends, but no one she's close to. And if she's done what we think, she went after what she wanted with complete disregard for whoever might have been standing in her way. And I don't think she feels any remorse. At first, her lack of upset made me think she wasn't guilty, but now I'm thinking that she just doesn't care."

"And most sociopaths are addicted to alcohol and drugs. Maybe she's the anonymous ketamine supplier at JHU."

"It certainly fits."

I parked the car and we got out, heading up the long driveway of the ridiculously large home.

"Maybe one of these days, I'll be able to buy you a place like this," Bobby commented as the trees surrounding the asphalt driveway gave way to a rolling green lawn that sloped gently upwards towards the house sitting at the pinnacle. Floodlights placed in random locations around the front yard threw hazy yellow light onto the gray stone exterior of the enormous structure, creating an ethereal effect.

"I got over that fantasy, remember? All I need now is a little apartment in Brooklyn."

His answering smile had my stomach doing somersaults which was ridiculous and yet it still happened.

He'd spoke of my smile earlier today, but his had the same effect on me. Maybe it was because of all those years we'd denied ourselves any physical contact. Back then, a smile was as good as it was going to get. And it was pretty damn good.

"So…am I befriending her, or challenging her, or are you going to be the charming older man?"

"I think I'm up this time. I'll be the nice guy and you hit her with the tough stuff."

I nodded in agreement as we climbed the stately front steps.

"Don't drink anything," I whispered as he rang the bell. "Or eat anything. If she's got a whole drug store at her disposal, I'm afraid to think what she might try to slip you."

"Or you," he reminded me.

The house remained quiet, so Bobby rang the bell again and I followed it up by banging on the heavy brass doorknocker.

Finally, a light came on in the foyer, and then the front porch light came on and I felt like we were standing under a spotlight.

"Who is it?"

The voice was without a doubt Cierra's, and Bobby looked at me and gave me a little nod, having recognized the voice, too.

"NYPD," he called out. "Open up."

There was a drawn-out pause while apparently Cierra decided whether or not to play hardball.

"Show me your badges," she said at last.

"You'll have to open the door."

"Just hold them up. I've got you on the security camera."

"What did I say about her being creepy?" I mumbled as I pulled out my badge.

Bobby held his up, too, and then said, "Come on, Cierra. You remember us from Baltimore. It hasn't even been a week."

"Oh, I thought you were investigators," she said brightly as she opened the heavy oak door.

"We are," I answered. "In Baltimore. In New York, we're cops."

"We'd like to ask you a few more questions," Bobby said in his most persuasive voice.

"You realize that it's after two in the morning, right?"

"I apologize about that, but time is of the essence. May we come in?"

She shrugged and opened the door fully, standing back to allow us entry.

"Are you here alone?" I asked her.

"My father and his wife will be out in two more weeks."

"So that's a yes?"

"Yes. I'm just here for the weekend. I have to go back to school on Monday. Finals, you know."

She closed the door behind us once we were inside and then led the way into a sitting room just off the foyer.

"Let me get you something to drink," she offered.

"No, thank you. We're fine."

"You let her answer for you?" she asked Bobby in a seductive, conspiratorial voice. "I guess I was wrong about you."

"How so?"

"You look like the type who likes to take charge and be the boss."

"Sometimes."

"So would you like a drink?"

She held a decanter in one hand and a glass in the other as though she was fully expecting him to say yes.

"No."

"Ah, well…I hate to drink alone. But I will."

She poured herself a heavy shot of the amber liquid and then sat down in a chair.

"Aren't you a little curious as to why we're here?" I asked her.

"I assume you have information concerning Kelly's death."

"Why would you assume that? It's been solved, right? Kenny killed her."

"Kenny? He said that?" she asked innocently, turning to Bobby for an explanation.

"You haven't heard? He committed suicide Thursday night, and he left a note taking responsibility."

She paused momentarily, holding Bobby's gaze, and then took a long sip of the liquor.

"I hadn't heard. I came up here Thursday afternoon."

"Really," I stated with obvious disbelief. That alibi was just a little too pat for me. "And why is that?"

"I needed a break."

"Classes are over next week."

"I've been studying hard, and with everything that's happened…"

"Everything. You mean Kelly's murder?"

"Well, yeah."

"It's bothered you," Bobby said in a soothing voice, pulling her attention back to him.

"She was my roommate. I can't help but think that it could've been me."

"You mean, if you were the one dating Jeremy?" I tossed out.

She shrugged and barely spared me a glance, so it was Bobby's turn again.

"When was the last time you saw Jeremy?"

"It's been a week. I saw him during the day last Friday."

"So you haven't seen him since the murder."

"No, why?"

"Well, the way we hear it, you've got a crush on him. He's in mourning. Maybe you tried to reach out…"

"In mourning?" she scoffed, letting some of her true emotion show through. "I'm sure he's over her by now. It's not like they were in love or anything."

"Oh, but they were," I corrected. "Very much so. In fact, they'd already made plans to be together after college."

"I don't buy it."

"Sure you do. Isn't that why you tried to tell Kelly that Jeremy was a loser who would never be able to make enough money on a cop's salary to give her the kind of life that she was used to?"

"I was just opening her eyes. But not because they'd made plans. Just because she was wasting the best years of her life hooking up with him. I mean, before long, we'll be in our mid-twenties, and then what happens? We'll end up looking like you."

I continued to stare at her blankly, trying hard not to be offended by her callous statement. I mean, in a way, hadn't she just suggested that I look like I'm in my twenties?

"Cierra, what happened today? Did you go see Jeremy?"

"What?" she asked, turning back to Bobby. "No, I told you, it was last week."

"And still…you're not asking why we're here. And you don't have any questions about Kenny. It kind of makes me think that you're not asking because you already know the answers."

"Look, I came up Thursday and I went grocery shopping so that I'd have food here for the weekend. Today, I spent all afternoon by the pool. If you'd like, I can show you my tan lines," she offered Bobby, and then she smiled coyly at him and added, "Or rather, my lack of tan lines."

"I'm sure you're bronzed perfectly," I said smartly. "So what else was on your shopping list besides food? Roofies? Coke?"

"No! I don't do that stuff."

"But that doesn't mean you don't have it."

"It means that I think we're done," she said, getting up from her chair.

We stared each other down for a moment, and then I relented and turned to head into the foyer.

"You'd better hope we don't catch a glimpse of you on any security footage," I said as I opened the front door. "Maybe at Southside ER?"

"Why on earth would I be there?"

"You tell us," Bobby said. "Did things get out of hand? Were you just trying to show him a good time, and then suddenly you couldn't wake him up?"

"Who are you talking about, Detective?" she asked innocently.

"Jeremy."

"Trust me, if Jeremy were to spend some time with me, the last thing in the world he'd want to do is go to sleep."

Bobby stepped outside, and I hesitated so that I could get toe to toe with her for a minute.

"Then why'd you have to give him so many drugs, huh? You loaded him with grain laced with roofie, and then you got him to do a little coke, only he still didn't want you, did he? So you gave him Viagra, too, thinking then he wouldn't have much say in the matter, is that it? Is that what it takes for you to get a man, Cierra?"

Her face clouded over while I offered her my take on what had happened, and I thought that maybe she was going to break. She really wanted to argue with me about it because it was killing her to think that I was making fun of her sex appeal.

But surprisingly, she got her temper under wraps.

"I don't know what you're talking about. I haven't seen Jeremy. And I don't do drugs. And I sure as hell don't have to drug a man to get him to sleep with me. Just ask your partner there," she said smugly, and then she smiled and added pointedly, "Right, Bobby?"

I didn't even bother to look back at him, because that would give her baseless suggestion some kind of merit, so instead, I just plastered on my fake smile and shook my head at her, but then she grabbed onto my arm and leaned close, whispering into my ear.

"Do you know where he was last night? Because I do."

"You're going to have to do better than that," I answered as I pulled my arm from her grasp. "Your juvenile games won't work on me. And if I were you, I'd get busy trying to hide the evidence, because we'll be back in the morning with a warrant."

I went out onto the porch with Bobby and I heard the door creak as she started to close it, but at the last second, Bobby turned back around.

"Oh, just one more question, Cierra."

"What?" she asked, slightly annoyed but unable to resist his interest in her, even if it was only to ask a question.

"Do you buy your own condoms?"

"That's not a question you ask a lady," she retorted, although she seemed to like the question. A lot. She stepped out onto the porch and gave Bobby a slow, head-to-toe visual inspection.

"I'm just curious," he told her. "You know, college kids…I was wondering if you're a modern kind of woman who brings her own, or if you depend on your lover to have them."

"If I depended on the guy, I'd have three kids by now," she said, tossing her hair back over her shoulder and pinning Bobby with a smoldering look. "You look like an XL kind of guy to me. I think I've got some of those around the house."

Bobby laughed self-consciously as though her assessment was embarrassing, but then he gave the follow-up.

"They're not all the same, you know. Some brands…"

"Durex," she interrupted proudly. "It's the only kind I buy."

She watched him expectantly for a moment, and then he thanked her and turned to walk down the steps, meeting me on the sidewalk before she called out her parting shot.

"Any time you want to trade in your outdated model…"

"Durex was the brand we found tucked under the mattress," he mumbled to me, ignoring her offer while looking very pleased with himself.

"Only you could get a woman to offer up her brand of choice of condoms," I remarked.

"You think it'll be enough to secure the warrant?"

"Well, I was bluffing when I said it, but now...I think maybe we've got enough circumstantial evidence to overwhelm a judge."

"Are you sure she did it?"

"You're not?"

"Oh, I am. I was just making sure."

"So now what?"

"Let's go back to Ross' house and see if we can sit in on Skoda's chat with Jeremy. If he can recover anything at all, it'll make our warrant sail through that much faster."

We got back to the car and I started the engine, but I felt Bobby's eyes on me, so I glanced over at him.

"What?"

"I can't believe you didn't hit her. She was really working hard to push your buttons."

"I can show restraint when I need to."

He smiled at me and then pulled out his notebook to jot down a few thoughts.

"And she was wrong," I added.

"She was wrong about a lot," he agreed.

"Uh huh, but one thing in particular."

He raised an eyebrow at me in question, and I flashed him a smile.

"Extra large? Please. That doesn't even come close."

**TBC...**

* * *

><p>AN: Off-topic request - I could use about a dozen sentences translated from English into Spanish for another project I'm working on - if anyone is fluent (and by that, I mean not using google!) and willing, please shoot me a PM.


	60. Chapter 60

**Logan POV**

* * *

><p>"You two look like hell."<p>

"Yeah, well, we haven't been to bed yet."

"Then what are you doing here?"

"I was hoping you made breakfast," Alex said as I stood back and gestured for them to come inside.

It was almost ten o'clock on Saturday morning, and I could only guess that they'd gotten a call-out, since they'd been out all night, but that didn't really explain their early morning visit, so I figured the least I could do was fix them coffee and eggs while they brought Carolyn and me up to speed.

"The grill's open," I confirmed with a grin. "And Carolyn's fixing the coffee now, so come on back."

I led the way to the kitchen where Carolyn was measuring out the coffee grounds and dumping them into the filter.

She was wearing my blue button-down shirt from yesterday, which hung down nearly to her knees, and even though it didn't look like it, I knew she had on a pair of gym shorts underneath. She'd grabbed them when the doorbell rang, just like I'd pulled on a t-shirt and shorts.

I mean, I love Bobby and Alex, but I was pretty sure they weren't interested in seeing me au naturel.

"I guess we got you guys out of bed," Bobby commented.

"I'm sure it's for good reason. Is something up?"

"Yeah, and maybe more than we know about. Have you talked to Bernard?"

"No, but I had a text from him," Carolyn said. "I just checked it a minute ago. It says to give him a call."

"I got that, too," Alex replied. "But when I called, it went to voice mail."

"He's not calling us for nothing," I remarked as I grabbed my phone. "Did you try Hayes?"

"I'm not sure that would do any good."

"She's got her mind right," I assured them.

"Yeah, what did you say to her last night?"

"Well, I could tell you," I teased. "But then I'd have to kill you."

"Ha ha," Alex snorted as she plucked the phone from my hand. "Why don't you get busy fixing my eggs and I'll try Bernard again."

"And by the way, where's your sling?" I asked Alex as she used my phone to call Bernard. She rolled her eyes at me, but I looked at Bobby and shook my head. "Are you slacking in your old age?"

"How'd I know you'd be the one to comment on that?" Alex asked smartly. "No, he's not slacking. I just don't need it anymore. It's been three weeks."

"Uh huh. Whatever you say."

"Nothing from Bernard," she commented as she pulled the phone from her ear and then dialed another number. After a minute she added, "Or Hayes either."

"Should we be worried?"

"Maybe," Bobby said thoughtfully. "But I don't know. They could just be together."

"But why would he text for us to call?"

"If it was urgent, he wouldn't have texted. He would've called."

I nodded, agreeing with his plausible theory.

"So did you guys get a case?" Carolyn asked, leaning back against the counter while I began pulling stuff from the fridge.

"No, we had to drive out to the Hamptons," Bobby explained.

I set the stuff down and looked at them inquisitively.

"Jeremy," Bobby said. "He didn't come home last night, so Ross called us. Liz was half out of her mind. I think Ross was too but he was afraid to admit it."

"And you found him in the Hamptons?" Carolyn asked worriedly.

"No, he turned up at Southside ER," Alex clarified. "They had to pump his stomach."

They alternated sentences, filling us in on everything they'd learned while searching Jeremy's room and then on the subsequent trip to Wainscott in search of Cierra.

"She doesn't sound like your typical college freshman," I remarked.

"Entitled, spoiled, arrogant…she thinks she's untouchable. But we'll see about that. We're going to check with Connie about getting a warrant."

"I hope you've got a unit sitting on her house."

"Absolutely. With her kind of money, she could flee to the country of her choice, probably one without extradition."

"She won't go anywhere without Jeremy," Carolyn commented. "If he's what she's after, and it sounds like he is."

"Which is a good thing at this point, because I think it's the only reason he's still alive. With everything she pumped into him, he was completely at her mercy."

"And he doesn't remember anything?"

"Not really, but Skoda's session was interesting."

We moved into the dining room and sat around the table so that we could eat while they finished the update, but before they could get started, my cell phone rang.

I hustled back into the kitchen and snagged it from the counter where Alex had left it.

"Bernard?" Carolyn asked as I rejoined the others with my phone in hand.

"Lupo. I guess they're anxious to get started today," I remarked as I hit the button. "Logan."

"Mulder isn't going to be able to help you out today."

I started to make a joke, but his affect was all wrong.

"Why, what's going on?" I asked with concern.

"Carl came after us last night."

"Last night?" I asked sharply.

"Yeah, I know. I should've called sooner, but…it's been…I wanted to wait for Mulder to get out of surgery."

"Shit, Lupo, what the hell happened?"

"He took one in the back," he answered shakily. "They worked on him for awhile."

"What's the word?"

"Touch and go for the next twenty-four hours. If he gets through it, then they think he'll be out of the woods."

I took a deep breath and met Carolyn's gaze. She was watching me expectantly, but I needed to get the rest of the details first.

"Connie's okay?" I asked.

"She's shaken up, but not hurt. And of course she's blaming herself for Mulder."

"Is it safe to say that Carl's at least in custody?"

"He's dead," he answered firmly. "And I'm already cleared. Bernard paved the way with IAB."

"So he's been with you? We've been trying to call him."

"It's tough to get a signal in the waiting room," he explained. "But yeah, he and Lauren have been here all night."

"Are Mulder's parents there?"

"No, his mom…she um…she didn't want to come. I'm not sure what that's about."

"Okay, well, what can we do?"

He let out a heavy sigh and said quietly, "I don't know. Pray?"

"How about I come relieve you instead?" I offered. "Carolyn and I will sit with Mulder so you guys can all go home, maybe get some rest and clean up."

"That would be great. Um…I can't leave just yet, but maybe in a couple of hours?"

"You can't leave? Why not?' I asked, and I should've known that Lupo wouldn't admit to whatever might have happened to him.

"It's nothing. I got a little debris in my arm and the doc wanted to hook me up for twelve hours of IV antibiotics," he said dismissively.

"We'll be there within the hour."

"You might want to think about hitting up Cutter for that warrant instead of Connie," I said after I hung up with Lupo, and then I relayed the information about last night's events.

"I told Lupo we'd come to relieve him so that Mulder won't be alone," I concluded.

"Of course," Carolyn agreed immediately.

"What a night, huh?" I said. "I think we're the only ones who got any sleep."

"Take it when you can get it," Bobby commented.

"Maybe, but I would've rather been running out to the Hamptons with you guys, or helping out Lupo. I hate when stuff happens and I don't find out until after the fact."

"You've still got Jack to worry about," Alex reminded us.

"He can wait," Carolyn said firmly. "He hasn't contacted me about moving the money yet anyway, so we've got time."

She left to go upstairs and shower, but I stayed at the table, feeling a little shell-shocked about what had happened.

I mean, we were all joking with Mulder just last night.

And now, he might die.

"So, tell me about Skoda," I said, forcing myself out of my morbid thoughts.

"He didn't really get anywhere yet," Bobby answered. "But he's going to see him on a daily basis for the next week or so. And Jeremy's tough. By the time we saw him, he had his composure back."

"You said the session was interesting," I reminded him. "How so?"

I watched him as he stared at Alex for a moment before answering.

"It's Liz."

"During the session, he referred to her as his stepmother," Alex added.

"And?"

"And he doesn't call her that. Skoda told us that he and Jeremy had a whole discussion about that yesterday. Jeremy thinks the term doesn't exemplify their relationship, so he always only calls her Liz."

"That's fairly incisive for a kid his age," I remarked.

"Yeah, but Nancy's his mother," Alex pointed out. "Liz has to be a godsend to him, so maybe it's important that he treats her better than the average stepparent."

"Okay, so in the session he called her his stepmother? In what context?"

"He said that he was worried about her. He said he didn't want anything to happen to his stepmother."

"That almost sounds ominous."

"Uh huh. That's what Skoda thinks. That Cierra took the opportunity of having his mind susceptible to suggestion by initiating the threat of consequences."

"She's manipulating his subconscious?" I asked incredulously.

"That's the working theory. She implanted in his mind the idea that if he gives her up, she'll hurt Liz as payback."

I hashed out thoughts with Bobby and Alex until Carolyn came back down, and then I left the three of them while I showered and dressed for the day.

Thirty minutes later, Carolyn and I left for Bellevue while Bobby and Alex went home to shower and change before getting in touch with Cutter.

"How's he doing?" I asked when we ran into Bernard and Hayes in the lobby of the hospital.

"He hasn't come around yet," Bernard answered. "But the doctor looked pleased the last time he came to check on him. He seems to think it's just a matter of time now."

"That's great news," Carolyn said with relief.

"And Lupo? Was it really just a little debris?"

Hayes barked out an incredulous laugh and looked over at Bernard as she said, "He had a strike plate in his arm. The whole damn thing."

"Carl was using cop killers," Bernard added, referring to type of ammunition used.

"And Lupo took him out…so I guess the joke's on him, then, huh?"

"I don't think anyone's going to be crying for Carl Babbitt. We've got CSU teams going through all of his residences this morning. And I meant to check his pockets before the ME took him away, but I got caught up talking to IAB."

"Yeah, Lupo said you fast-tracked him."

"Why the pockets?" Carolyn asked.

"Connie's ring. I don't know if he had it on him or not, but I bet he did. If he didn't want it for some sick, twisted purpose, then why not just toss it when he pulled it off of her?"

"Good point. I'm sure the ME's office will have it bagged if it was in there."

"I'm going to call Liz and see if she can check it out."

"That's…probably not a good idea," I said.

So then I told them about what had happened with Jeremy. Or at least, the generalities anyway, and so they decided to stop off by the morgue themselves and see if they could recover the ring. I could only imagine that their adrenaline was still flowing and yet there wasn't much else to do at this point, so they just needed to do _something_.

Bernard took a moment to explain to Carolyn where to find Lupo, and while he did that, I gave Hayes a quick hug.

"Doing okay, kiddo?"

"Better, thanks to you," she replied.

"Hey, I just reminded you of what you already knew."

"I'm not sure that was it."

"Whatever," I said dismissively. "And don't forget my offer."

The two of them went on their way and we went up to find Lupo and Connie, who were both sitting next to Mulder's bed.

"Nothing yet?"

"No, but his vitals have improved," Connie answered. She kept her gaze on the monitor next to the bed.

Lupo was still hooked up to an IV, and he had a three-inch wide bandage around his arm.

"Debris, huh?" I asked him.

"Forty-seven stitches," Connie said, finally bringing her eyes to mine.

"Are they going to let you go any time soon?" Carolyn asked.

"The nurse went to get my discharge papers, but she hasn't come back."

"I'll get her," Carolyn said, and then she went back out into the hall.

Twenty minutes later, we kicked Lupo and Connie out the door and then the two of us took over the vigil.

We sat with him for more than six hours.

Nurses came and went, and so did doctors, but his parents still didn't show up, and his condition didn't change.

Bobby and Alex came by after striking out with the warrant.

"Too circumstantial," she'd said.

"Those were Cutter's words?"

"Those were the judge's words," Bobby answered in frustration. "Cutter even got slapped with a fine for telling him the denial of the warrant was injudicious and short-sighted."

"The more I learn about that guy, the more I like him."

"Uh huh," Alex agreed. "But we got permission to keep the units on her for now, so at least she's not going anywhere. And as long as she's being watched, she can't do anything more to Jeremy."

We chatted for a few more minutes, but then we sent them on their way. Of course, they offered to stay but they hadn't slept since Thursday night, so they needed to go home and get some sleep.

It was almost seven o'clock when Lupo and Connie got back.

"You two look a hell of a lot better than you did this morning."

And they did.

They'd been able to get some much-needed rest.

Not only that, but also Connie had her engagement ring back on her finger where it belonged.

_And_ after they'd been back in the room for a few minutes, almost as though he'd been waiting for his heroes to return, Mulder opened his eyes.

TBC...


	61. Chapter 61

**Hayes POV**

* * *

><p>"Are you ready to go home?"<p>

It was the second time in twenty-four hours that Bernard had asked me that question.

Was I ready to go home…as in, to my place.

With him.

I liked his presumptuousness.

Not that he was going to be moving in any time soon, but it made me feel good that despite my efforts to push him away, he'd remained steadfastly next to me.

And behind me.

In fact, he'd dug his heels in fairly well, and as frustrating as it was at the time, looking back on it, his loyalty and commitment to pursuing a relationship with me was something I had yet to run across in all my thirty-five years.

It made me think that we had a real shot.

"Yeah, you promised me make-up sex remember?" I teased.

We'd just left Lupo and Connie's place, having returned the stolen ring.

Their elevator was fixed, which was a good thing since the stairwell was still cordoned off. I couldn't help but glance in the direction of the large blood stain in the stairwell doorway.

It made me nauseous, thinking about Mulder.

I'd held onto his hand in the ambulance, but then I'd been shoved aside when they had to shock him.

Twice.

He's one hell of a fighter, though, and I had to trust the doctors when they said that he'd be okay.

There was another blood stain on the carpeting outside of Lupo's apartment door.

That one didn't bother me much at all.

And I was glad the incident had taken place in the hall, as opposed to actually inside their apartment.

To think that they'd been only a few minutes away from being ambushed as they entered their home…the outcome would've likely been so much worse.

We'd kept our visit brief, knowing that they were both exhausted, and it was early afternoon by the time we got back down on the street to where I'd parked the car.

"Did you think that I'd forget about that?" Bernard responded.

He reached over to settle his hand along the back of my neck, and as he spoke I noticed that his voice was low and husky.

Maybe from lack of sleep.

Or maybe from interest.

Probably a little of both.

Neither of us got any sleep last night, and Thursday night wasn't much better. Even Wednesday, my sleep had been fitful at best, and my nightmare had awakened both of us, so we were long overdue for a solid eight hours.

But not yet.

Because before I could sleep, or engage in the much-needed make-up sex, there was something else I had to do.

"No, I didn't think you'd forget," I replied with a smile. "But actually, I'd like to make another stop first, if you don't mind."

"You're driving," he said easily, his fingers gently massaging my neck.

He didn't ask where we were going, which was just one more thing to add to the list of things I like about him.

We rode in pleasant silence all the way to Manhattan SVU.

It didn't occur to me until we checked in with the desk sergeant that she might not be working today.

"I'm here to see Detective Benson," I stated, pretending as though I wasn't scared to death.

I was really going to do this.

"Bernard!"

I turned around to see a woman entering the lobby. She was carrying a paper sack and two cups of coffee, apparently just returning from a lunch run.

"Olivia," he replied in greeting.

"You didn't tell me she was gorgeous," I said under my breath to Bernard as we crossed the lobby to meet her.

He looked at me curiously and shrugged, as though that fact had never entered his mind. It was strange how different men and women's perspectives could be sometimes.

"We were just coming up to see you," Bernard said as he stuck out his hand, but then he retracted it as Olivia glanced down at her full hands.

"New partner?" she questioned, looking at me.

"Temporary assignment," he explained vaguely. "She goes back to the 2-7 on Monday."

"2-7, huh? Homicide?"

"That's right," I acknowledged with a tight smile.

The three of us stood awkwardly for a moment as Bernard watched me, obviously not sure whether or not to introduce me by name.

He was giving me the opportunity to change my mind.

Because Olivia may not know me, but she'd definitely know my name.

Although she'd seen the file, so…would she recognize the woman I was today from the documentation photos in the jacket?

I don't know, but it didn't matter.

Because I was definitely doing this.

"Lauren Hayes," I said, introducing myself. "I was hoping maybe you have a few minutes."

So the three of us went upstairs and then Bernard made the rounds, chatting up a few old acquaintances while Olivia and I went into a conference room.

And it really wasn't so bad.

I think maybe I was finally on the right path.

"I'm glad you decided to press charges," she said after we'd talked for a while. "That way we can keep this guy locked up."

"So you'll send this file over to the DA's office?"

"I can do it this afternoon."

"No. Wait and do it Monday. I want ADA Rubirosa to handle it."

"We don't usually get to pick."

"No, but she'll do it."

I was going to meet up with Connie between now and then to let her know that my file was coming, because ultimately, I thought it would be better if it was handled by a friend.

"I'll take care of it," she promised. She closed the file and looked at me carefully. "Are you doing okay with all of this? You know, there are people I can recommend…if you need to talk to someone."

"No, I'm good. I'm…actually much better. And I know a good therapist," I added with a smile, thinking about Logan.

"So you've been working in Major Case?" she asked conversationally as we went back into the squad room.

"For three weeks, but we've wrapped it up, so my partner and I will be going back to the 2-7. How long have you known Bernard?"

"Oh, for years. You know, from his IAB days," she replied dismissively. "He helped me out once."

"So you owed him a favor?"

"Well, yeah, but...this? This wasn't a favor. This was just what we do."

We left the precinct, and I felt scared and relieved and unburdened all at once.

Bernard didn't ask questions, but instead just walked with me to the car. Once we were inside, he turned in his seat so that he was facing me.

"What?" I asked self-consciously.

"I'm so proud of you. I know that had to be hard."

"We expect it from victims every day. How can I ask others to do it if I can't do it myself?"

"That doesn't make it any easier."

"No," I agreed.

"You know, if you need some time to…I don't know. Gather your thoughts. Call your parents. Whatever. You can drop me by my place. I'm not so needy that I can't respect the fact that you might want some time alone."

I reached out and touched his scruffy cheek.

"You need to shave."

"Desperately," he agreed with a slow smile. "It's been a busy couple of days."

"And you need a nap."

"I'm not sure a couple of hours is going to do it."

"I've got razors," I offered. "And shaving cream. And a really comfortable bed."

"You don't have to talk me into anything. I just thought you might need…"

"You, okay? I want some downtime with _you_."

"Then what are you waiting for?" he asked, smiling fully now. "Start the car."

So I drove us back to my place, and he held my hand the entire way, slowly stroking his thumb over the back of it.

"So…Olivia," I commented as I found a place to park. "Was there ever anything between the two of you?"

"No," he answered quickly. "Seriously? Are you jealous?"

"She's just…yeah. I mean, she's beautiful, and she obviously thinks highly of you, and…"

"And she's just another detective," he interrupted smoothly. "Up until now, I've done a really good job keeping my private life out of the office."

"I guess it's a good thing I won't be in your office anymore, huh?"

"You know what I mean. I don't date detectives."

I raised my eyebrow at him and he quickly added, "I _didn't_ date detectives."

"Uh huh," I said as I got out of the car. "Sorry to ruin your streak, B."

"I'm not," he answered, throwing his arm across my shoulders. "In fact, I'm really glad you did."

He kissed me lightly as we continued walking towards the front of my building.

"Is this what it's going to be like? Public displays of affection in the middle of the afternoon? Jeez, guys, that's why you have an apartment."

Of course, it was Mary.

She was standing on the top step.

For the purpose of what, I have no idea, but she looked strangely pleased about having caught us kissing.

"I have an apartment so that I have somewhere to sleep," I countered. "And a place to keep all of my stuff. It's not solely for PDA's. In fact, if we were in my apartment, it wouldn't exactly be a public display, would it?"

"Someone ate her Wheaties this morning," Mary fired back good-naturedly.

"Uh huh. And why are you lurking out on the front porch?"

"I'm not lurking. I'm waiting. There's a difference."

"Waiting for what?" Bernard asked.

"My new boss is sending a messenger over with some files."

"You know there's a buzzer on the building, right? You don't have to wait outside when you're expecting someone."

"I know that," she replied smartly. Then she let out an annoyed breath and ran her hand through her hair. "I just want to make sure…I don't know. He doesn't buzz the wrong building or something."

"Buzz the wrong building?" I asked skeptically.

"Okay, I'm excited. Are you happy now? I haven't worked for three whole days and I'm anxious to get started at the new job because I'm bored out of my mind, and unpacking isn't really my thing."

"How's that going?"

"It's ridiculous," she said, shaking her head. "I swear, there weren't that many boxes to start with. It's like they're multiplying when my back's turned. I have some kind of…mutant…bunny boxes."

Bernard chuckled at her ramblings while I offered, "I need to sleep, but tomorrow I'll come over and help."

"Yeah, I heard about your night last night," she said seriously. "Good riddance, Carl, right?"

"Definitely," I agreed. "So, I'll call you in the morning, okay?"

"Ditching me already, Hayes? You're in a hurry for…what was it again? Sleep?"

"Sleep," I said firmly as I tugged on Bernard's hand, pulling him towards the doorway. "And yeah, I'm in a hurry for it."

"Well, have fun with that. And yeah, if you want to come by tomorrow, that would be great. I'm not going to turn down free help."

We left Mary standing outside and went upstairs to my apartment.

"You're going to like having her in your building, aren't you?" Bernard asked with a smile.

I closed the door behind us and immediately went into his arms.

It felt so good to be held by him, and my exhaustion was nearly overwhelming. The emotional stress of the past several days, combined with the lack of sleep…it was too much.

"I'm going to like having you in my apartment," I corrected. "It feels like it's been forever."

"Last night was…."

"Interrupted. But the night before was all me. I'm sorry I kicked you out."

"I'm pretty sure that we moved past that last night."

"Yeah? Do you remember exactly where we were?"

"Uh huh," he hummed as he rubbed his hands over my back. "But I think we bypass the couch and go straight to the bedroom."

"You're a guy who goes after what you want, huh?"

"I'm the guy who's going to give you what you need," he countered, and then he pulled back and ran his hand over my hair. "Sleep."

"Sleep?" I questioned, although as much as I wanted him, sleep was fast winning the battle.

"That comes first," he said as he took my hand and led the way to the bedroom.

"And then?"

"And then we'll pick up where we left off last night."

TBC...


	62. Chapter 62

**Bobby POV**

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><p>"He doesn't possess the standard vulnerabilities that would allow for successful manipulation, so maybe the excessive use of drugs was like an experiment."<p>

"You mean she tried getting him drunk, and when that didn't make him vulnerable enough, she went through an assortment of various stimulants and depressants in an effort to find out which concoction would make him listen?"

Oddly enough, we were having this conversation while taking a shower.

Alex had laid down the law that all shop-talk needed to happen before we got into the bed, and since my mind was stuck on Cierra, I figured now was a good time to purge my thoughts.

Because I wasn't about to go against Alex's wishes.

Not because I'm scared of her or anything.

But because spending the afternoon in bed with her _not_ talking about work sounded like heaven to me.

We'd left Mike and Carolyn at the hospital with Mulder, and then checked in by text with Lupo.

He hadn't responded, but I hoped that meant he was sleeping.

Not long after that, Bernard had sent a message to tell us that he and Hayes had recovered Connie's stolen engagement ring.

So now we were back at our apartment, and we decided to take another shower before climbing into the bed.

"It makes sense," I said as I picked up the bar of soap. "Otherwise, why get him drunk _and_ give him roofies? And why use cocaine at all? If anything, that would've made him more likely to be combative."

"True. But what about the Viagra?"

"Seduction is a classic technique of a sociapath. I mean, you saw her. She was trying it with me, too. She can't help herself. And she's young enough and naïve enough to think that the drug would create desire instead of just the ability."

"There's nothing naïve about that girl."

"I'm curious about her parents."

"Why?"

"She threatened Liz. Or at least we think she did. But why?"

"She knows Jeremy loves her," Alex said simply.

She turned around so that her back was to me, and I immediately began running my sudsy hands down her back and over her butt.

She stood still, tilting her head slightly to one side, and I was pretty sure that she had her eyes closed.

She loves the feel of my hands on her, which works out great for me since I love touching her.

"But how does she know that?" I posed. "I don't picture him opening up to her. And why use her instead of Ross?"

"You think she has her own stepmother issues?"

"It's possible. Or she just hates women in general and she sees Liz as female competition for Jeremy's affection," I suggested.

She turned back around and picked up the soap so that she could go to work on me.

"She made a lot of progress in a short period of time," she said practically.

It was funny how this conversation was exactly like one of thousands that we'd had over the years. With the exception of the fact that she presently had her arms around me, washing my backside even though I was facing her. We'd done this countless times since last fall, but I still couldn't help but think about how much higher our solve rate would've been before if we'd conducted our brain-storming sessions like this over the past decade instead of just the past eight months.

"Jeremy doesn't seem interested in pursuing Kelly's killer anymore," she continued. "And he doesn't seem worried in regaining his memories from last week. It's like she made him not care what happened."

"I think she threw the whole book at him. She probably went straight down Simon's list. Denial that she'd done anything wrong. Rationalization for her feelings for Jeremy. Minimization of her hatred of Kelly, and so on. His nearly catatonic state would've meant that he was absorbing her words without having the ability to dispute any of them."

"So why'd she let him go?"

"My guess? He still didn't want to sleep with her, even after the brain-washing and the Viagra."

"So you don't think she forced herself on him?"

"No. She thinks too highly of herself for that."

"So in her mind it's okay to buff him up with drugs designed to make him want to have sex and then throw herself at him, but she won't actually force the issue if he still resists."

I shrugged, knowing that it sounded strange, but believing it all the same.

"I bet she talked about it like it was actually happening. And I bet she did the same thing last Friday night, too."

"Which is why in his subconscious, he thinks he did."

"Uh huh. And she probably figures that soon enough, he'll do it for real."

"Her real obsession is Kelly, isn't it? I mean, that's why she wants Jeremy so much. She wants Kelly's life."

"You know what I want?" I asked, reaching around her to turn off the water.

"I hope so. Does it involve a king-sized bed and a few hours of sleep?"

"It just involves you. Everything else is secondary."

So we dried each other off and got into the bed.

But of course, sleep didn't come just because I wanted it to.

"You know how Cutter said that we just had the misfortune of drawing a straight-laced judge?"

"Bobby…"

"No, just one thought and then I'm done. I promise."

"Okay. Go ahead."

"Well, I'm wondering what our odds are of drawing a good judge in Baltimore."

"You want to search her dorm room?"

"I'd like to see what's on her computer, wouldn't you?"

"So we wait until she drives back on Monday…"

"Uh huh."

"And we can ask the owner of the BMW for permission to search the car."

"Right again."

"Very good plan."

"I think better when you're naked and pressed against me."

"Oh, really? Then I must not be doing something right. You're not supposed to be able to think at all."

She'd been lying on her side, with her back to me, and I had my arm around her, anchoring her against me, but as she said the words, she deliberately shifted backwards, pressing her body into mine in just the right places.

"Go ahead," she encouraged in a teasing voice. "You were talking about Baltimore."

"I'm sure I wasn't," I answered as I brought my hand up into her hair, pushing it away so that I could kiss the back of her neck. "Because you made a hard and fast rule about no shop-talk in the bed."

"Hard and _fast_? That doesn't sound like me," she said suggestively as she turned in my arms and brought her lips to mine.

"It doesn't sound like me, either."

And it wasn't.

The fast part, I mean.

I spent quite a bit of time slowly making love to her and thoughts of the case or Baltimore never entered my mind.

And we didn't get out of bed until the sun came up on Sunday morning.

Skoda was scheduled to meet with Jeremy at ten, so we were up and dressed and at Ross' house by nine-thirty.

I wanted to sit in on another session, and maybe ask a few questions myself.

"Danny will be down in a few minutes. Coffee?" Liz offered after letting us into the house.

"Sure," Alex agreed. "Did you get some sleep last night?"

"We all did. It looks like you two did, too."

"About twelve hours, I think," I answered.

"I talked to Lupo this morning," Alex told her as she accepted a steaming mug. "It sounds like Mulder is out of the woods."

"I went over there last night," Liz said with a nod.

"You did?"

"I just wanted to check things out for myself. And I thought if I left the boys alone, it might encourage them to talk to each other."

"How'd that work?"

"Jeremy opened up about all kinds of things, but he's still clueless about Friday."

"But they're working on their relationship," I clarified. "I'm glad to hear it."

Liz smiled at me as she poured another cup and then passed it off to me.

"Me, too. And when I spoke with Mulder's doctor, he seems to think that after a few more days, he can probably go home. It'll take him several weeks before he's feeling even close to normal, but getting out of the hospital will be a good thing."

"Getting out and going home to parents who didn't care enough to drive through the tunnel?" Alex questioned.

"I wondered about their conspicuous absence. What's their deal?"

"I have no idea. So did you see Lupo and Connie?"

"They were there," she said with a nod. "Both of them looked like a weight's been lifted, what with Carl in the morgue and Mulder on the mend. I can't imagine how stressing that must have been for them, always wondering where he was going to pop up next."

"You've got enough stress of your own. You don't need to be wondering about theirs," Alex remarked.

"I could say the same thing about you, and yet here you two are, on a Sunday, still working the case that's no longer a case."

"Yeah, well, it's what we do," I said with a shrug.

"We're going down to Baltimore later. We want to talk the locals into getting a warrant for Cierra's dorm room, and wait to serve it when she gets back. That'll give us access to her laptop, and whatever else she takes back from her weekend visit."

"And we'll search the BMW, too," I added. "If we can prove Jeremy was in it…"

"Then she'll say that the two of us went on a date."

I turned to see that Jeremy was standing in the kitchen doorway.

"But you didn't."

"Who's going to believe me?"

"I do."

"I don't know. I'm starting to think that it doesn't matter."

"You really don't want to know the truth?" I asked him in surprise.

He glanced hesitantly around the room, and then Liz said, "I'm going to see what's keeping your dad."

She slipped past Jeremy and up the stairs, so then he moved into the kitchen and sat down at the table.

"It's not worth the cost," he said quietly.

"Of what?" Alex asked.

"You guys are here, on your weekend. My dad's missed time off from work, and his reputation has to be taking a hit. I mean, everybody knows about this, right? How good does it look for the chief of D's to have a son involved in a murder investigation? And now add to that the fact that I had my damn stomach pumped two nights ago…it's like I'm trying to get him fired or something. And Liz…"

He paused and looked up at me with such anguish on his face that I walked over to him and settled my hand on his shoulder in an effort to comfort him.

"Liz cried when we got home from the hospital. She thinks I don't know, but I heard her and my dad talking…she said that I could've died. That I probably should've died."

"That's right," Alex said firmly. "Because of Cierra."

"The truth doesn't change just because you stop searching for it," I told him. "And I don't believe for one second that either your dad or Liz is ready to let this go."

"And as for your dad losing his job…that's never going to happen," Alex added. "He's too good at it. You know that. Because that's going to be you in twenty years, right?"

"How? With all of this mess, how in the world am I supposed to just move forward like nothing ever happened?"

"Because that's how it works," I told him.

"Think about what she's done, Jeremy," Alex continued. "_She's_ causing this, not you."

"I know," he said, shaking his head. "But this little voice in the back of my head keeps telling me to drop it."

"That's because that little voice isn't yours," I told him. "It's Cierra's. She tried to brainwash you the other night, and it looks to me like it's working."

"She put all this shit in my head?"

"That's what we think, yes," Alex answered.

"Oh, man," he muttered.

"You need to focus on getting justice for Kelly," I reminded him. "That's what cops do. We go after the truth and we don't stop until we find it."

I paused until he looked up at me, and then I said, "So are we doing this?"

He nodded slowly and I could literally see the conviction building.

"Yeah, let's get the bitch."

TBC...


	63. Chapter 63

**A/N: Dora87 was missing John & Mary, so...here you go! Hope this perks you up today!**

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><p><strong>John Strathmore POV<strong>

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><p>"What are you doing?"<p>

"I have no idea."

"Seriously?" was his dubious response.

"Well, I mean...it's not like I'm going to give it to her tomorrow. But eventually…yeah."

I closed up the small velvet box and shoved it back into my underwear drawer.

My underwear drawer in Mary's new apartment.

Because she'd given me that, along with two other drawers and some closet space.

"_You don't want to have to traipse across the bridge every time you need a change of clothes_," she'd said practically as if it was no big deal.

But I knew that it was.

Mary didn't like infringements upon her personal space. She'd told me before that the only man she'd ever lived with was Rafe, and she'd resented his intrusion on her privacy.

"_How can you be sure you won't end up resenting me?"_ I'd asked, slightly wary of following in my unsuccessful predecessor's footsteps.

"_Because I want you here."_

"_You didn't want him in your home?"_

"_It just evolved into that. It wasn't a conscious decision, and I'm pretty sure it wasn't my decision at all."_

"_I'll still have my place at the Millennium,"_ I'd reminded her self-consciously.

"_I know. This is just for when you want to sleep over."_

"_What about when you want to sleep over with me? You know, I've got room service."_

"_Then you'd better give me a drawer at your place,"_ she'd answered with a grin.

So we weren't moving in together.

But it was still a big deal.

So was the diamond ring in the back of my underwear drawer.

"Mary's great, but John…I don't know if she's the type to want to get married," Mike told me.

"Yeah, well, neither were you. Neither was Carolyn. I've heard all of the stories."

"But you've only been together for a few months."

"I didn't show you so that you'd try to talk me out of it."

"Then why'd you show me?"

"Because. You're my brother. I…wanted you to know. And I want to know what you think, which is apparently that I'm out of my mind," I said, with more than a little disappointment.

Not that his opinion was going to change my course of action, but I'd really hoped to have his support.

"Hey," he said as he clasped his hand on my shoulder. "That's not what I'm saying. I just don't want you to rush into anything. Marriage is a huge step, and..."

"I'm in love with her," I interrupted. "And maybe that sounds crazy to you since I haven't known her for that long, and because she used to be Heidi's witsec inspector, but that's where I am. I'm to the point where I don't see myself ever being with anyone else. The partying, the one-night stands…I'm done with that. Mary's it for me."

"Wow," he said as he broke into a grin. "Good. I just wanted to make sure."

"What, you were baiting me into spouting off my true feelings?"

"You've got to learn how to express yourself if you're going to be a married man," he teased.

"Express myself," I repeated, barking out a laugh. "Have you met Mary?"

He laughed with me for a minute, and then asked, "So does she know that you love her?"

"I told her."

"And?"

"It only took her another day to tell me back," I admitted, remembering that incredible night in the hotel bathtub.

I wasn't ever going to forget that, staring at her across the mound of steamy bubbles and watching her eyes as she said the words.

"A day," he said with a nod. "I'm impressed. Actually, I'm impressed that she said it at all. I mean, I believe that she feels it, but she's not the most forthcoming person."

"No, but that's okay. I love her like she is."

"John!" Mary shouted from the other room. "Are you two going to bond all day or are you going carry all of this crap downstairs?"

"Really? Just like she is?" Mike asked quietly as we left the bedroom.

"Oh, yeah."

"So, when are you going to pop the question?"

"I'm taking it slow. Maybe Christmas."

"And yet you already bought the ring?"

"It matches the necklace and earrings."

We got to the doorway of the kitchen where Carolyn and Mary were finalizing the giveaway boxes, but Mike stopped me briefly before we joined them.

"I think it's great," he said sincerely.

"Yeah?"

"Really," he promised, and then he slipped into the kitchen and snagged Mary around the waist, kissing her firmly on the cheek. "Now, what's with all the bitching about carrying boxes? I thought you were supposed to be a progressive woman."

"Progressive? What gave you that idea? I'm practical, and that means the ones with more muscle carry the boxes."

"And I've got more than you?" Mike asked her, moving his assault from Mary to Carolyn.

"It's iffy," she said with a shrug. "But I'm gonna give you the benefit of the doubt, so take your lips off your wife and get busy."

"I'm not sure that bossy is a strong enough word for you," Mike grumbled good-naturedly as he let go of Carolyn and picked up a box.

"It's not," I agreed teasingly. "More like dictatorial."

"Tyrannical," Mike added. "Authoritarian."

"Flattery won't get you out of work," she retorted, swatting me on the butt as I followed Mike into the foyer.

We had a guy coming to pick up the stuff that she was donating, but she'd told him that we'd meet him downstairs with the boxes, instead of having him come up.

"_You know that's what they do, right? When they offer to do pick-up, it doesn't mean from the sidewalk."_

"_I don't want strangers walking around my apartment."_

"_The movers were here. And the delivery guys who brought the bed," _I reminded her.

"_Yeah, and that's my quota for the year."_

"_You're afraid they'll take something by accident."_

"_Maybe,_" she admitted.

"_If you had everything unpacked, you wouldn't have to worry about it."_

"_If you hadn't forced me to test out the durability of the new bed, then I might be unpacked,"_ she countered.

I very rarely won arguments with her.

But that was fine with me.

Even though it was her nature to be difficult and overbearing, when it was important, she listened.

And if she didn't feel comfortable having the pick-up guys in the apartment, then I didn't mind hauling the boxes downstairs. I'd recruited Mike to help, and it had given me a chance to talk with him, and to show him the ring.

"Did you get a status update on Mulder?" I asked Mike as we rode down in the elevator.

"He's awake and talking. Lupo and Connie went back over there this morning, and he sent me a text a little while ago. The doc said that two inches to the left and Mulder would've been paralyzed. As it stands, he should go home on Wednesday or Thursday."

"And Lupo killed the guy, huh?"

"Three to the chest."

"There's never a dull moment around you guys," I said quietly, shaking my head.

"Not usually, no," he agreed.

"You love it."

"The excitement? Definitely. But I don't much care for my friends getting shot."

The elevator doors opened, so we each picked up our boxes and went through the lobby, out to the front steps. The truck hadn't arrived yet, so we put down our load and settled in for the wait.

"Mulder was going to help you guys out this weekend, wasn't he?"

"Yeah…this thing with Jack. We're trying to find the account that he opened using Carolyn's name so that we can be a step ahead of him when he tries to get her to transfer it."

"How much is in it?"

"Fourteen mil. Or at least, that's what he says."

"Stolen money?"

"Probably. Or laundered counterfeits."

"I'm on a first name basis with quite a few bankers in the Caymans. I might be able to help you out. Or at the very least, I can probably eliminate some banks from your search."

"Now why didn't I think about that?" he asked with a grin. "My millionaire brother has to know about off-shore banking."

"Hey, I can't keep it all in one place," I said simply. "And guys like me tend to get the red carpet treatment, so…"

Mike stared at me for another minute and then checked his watch.

"What time's this guy supposed to be here?"

"Twelve-thirty. We're a few minutes early."

"That's because the boss was cracking the whip," he said as he began fiddling with his finger, the one that used to sport his father's ring.

It was a nervous habit of his, one that I'd picked up on, even though he'd apparently stopped wearing the ring on the same night that I met him.

But the lack of ring hadn't stopped the subconscious motion.

"What's on your mind?" I asked him. "We haven't talked much lately."

"Yeah, I know."

"So…"

"I told you that Jack was playing mind games with us, but I didn't tell you what it was about."

"And?"

"He suggested to Carolyn that I might be responsible for our mother's death."

"That's crazy."

"I know that. And she knows that. But we had to pull the file so that we'd know what he was looking at."

He broke eye contact with me and instead stared at the cars lining the street.

My curiosity was up, but I had to be patient with him. He'd endured a living hell, being raised by our mother, and I'd had the good fortune of being the child she'd left behind.

I couldn't help but feel a little guilty about that, even though I knew it was completely beyond my control.

"That's Bernard's car," he said quietly, pointing at the unmarked cop car halfway down the block.

"Maybe he came over for brunch," I suggested wryly.

He barked out a laugh and shook his head, bringing his eyes back to mine.

"I gave the file to Bobby and Alex because I didn't want to read it. And I'm glad I didn't. There was a ten-page statement from the hospice nurse that recounted detailed discussions between her and our mother."

"About what?"

"About some of the things she did to me."

"Mike…"

"No, it's fine. That's not what's bothering me. I mean, hell, I already knew what she did, so it's not like it's anything new. And Bobby and Alex knew most of it, too, so I'm not worried about them reading it."

"Then what is it?"

"Bobby said she made several references to the fact that I have my father's eyes."

"And she hated him, so she took it out on you," I reasoned, but he shook his head.

"Dad didn't have eyes like mine. I couldn't remember for sure when Bobby first mentioned it, but I found a couple of pictures this morning, and even the shape of his isn't the same."

"That's because ours are like our mother's. That's why you and I look so much alike. We both take after her."

"In looks," he stated emphatically.

"Right," I agreed quickly.

"But my point is, if the shape is mom's, then it must be the color that's my dad's. And my dad's eyes were dark brown."

"So you think he's not your real father."

He shrugged and looked out across the street again.

"I don't know what to think. Her ramblings could've just been that of a sick old woman. And God knows she spent most of her time drunk, so maybe she just saw in me what she wanted to see."

"What are you going to do about it?"

"Nothing. I just…don't care."

"I bet that's what you said when you first heard about me, too."

"Maybe," he confessed sheepishly.

"And then you sent Bobby to check me out," I said teasingly.

"Of course I did," he replied with a smile. "If you were a dick, Bobby would've run interference for me until the case was over. Besides, are you going to try to say that you didn't check me out, too?"

"No, I did," I admitted.

"We're both cautious guys. We must get that from our mother," he said cynically.

"We get it for different reasons," I corrected. "You, because you were raised never being able to trust anyone."

"And you because you're stinking rich," he stated with a grin.

"How come you've never asked me for anything?" I asked him suddenly.

It was something I'd wondered about from time to time, but I didn't want to insult him by asking.

Now, I thought we were past that point.

"For money? Why would I do that?"

"Because I have a lot of it. And we're brothers. You have to know I'd give you the shirt off my back."

"Your shirt, I'll take if I need it. Not your money," he said firmly, not seeming upset by my question, but also not acting like it had ever once occurred to him.

"You're a first class guy, Mike. And I don't think it makes a damn bit of difference if your father was John Logan or John Doe. You're your own man."

He nodded thoughtfully and then we both looked back at the lobby doors as they came open.

"It's Detective Bernard, doing the walk of shame," Mike joked as Bernard exited the building.

Bernard looked slightly embarrassed, but then he got over it.

"Shame would indicate that I was doing something I'm trying to hide," he answered. "Which I'm _not._ So what's with the boxes?"

"Mary's got a guy coming to pick this stuff up and take it to Goodwill," I answered. "I guess you and Lauren made up?"

"We're fine," he answered vaguely.

"I thought I told you two no sleeping together until Monday," Mike said.

"Last time I checked, you're not my boss," Bernard replied as he sat down next to us on the steps. Then he glanced at me and said, "Lauren's headed upstairs to give Mary a hand."

"And you're going home? We've got more boxes…"

"I haven't been home since Friday morning," he answered. "A change of clothes would be nice."

"You need to get her to give you a drawer," Mike said conspiratorially. "John has three."

"And half of the closet," I added.

"Hey, I'm just taking it one step at a time," Bernard said.

"One step? You've known her three weeks and you're skulking out of her apartment at noon on a Sunday. I think you skipped a few steps."

"Okay, first of all, I was not skulking."

"And second?"

"Yeah, okay, we skipped a few steps. But it's working, so don't knock it."

Mike held his hands up in acquiescence and shook his head.

"I like Lauren," he told him. "So if you like her, I'm tickled shitless."

"I'm pretty sure I owe you a thank you," Bernard said, looking pointedly at Mike, and even though they'd been teasing each other until now, they were both suddenly serious.

I didn't know details, but I figured it had something to do with Friday night.

"No thanks needed," Mike deflected graciously. "So…she's good?"

"Yeah. Whatever you said to her, it definitely helped."

Bernard looked at Mike curiously, but he just nodded and said, "Good."

And then the guy from Goodwill showed up, so our break time was over. Bernard stayed to help, and the three of us made seven trips back and forth between the apartment and the front sidewalk until finally all of the giveaway boxes were loaded.

"Now what?" Bernard asked as the truck pulled away.

"Now John's going to impress me with his knowledge of the Cayman banking system," Mike said. "Are you in?"

Bernard looked down at himself as though he was debating the importance of a shower and clean clothes versus seeing what I could find out.

His inquisitiveness won out.

Although Mike blamed it on something else.

"It's the shorts, isn't it?" he asked knowingly as we went up in the elevator.

"What?" Bernard asked as though he was crazy, but even I could tell he was lying.

"You saw Lauren in those short little shorts, and you can't make yourself walk away."

"I've seen Lauren _out_ of those shorts," he reminded Mike with a wry grin. "And what are you doing looking at her anyway? You should be looking at your wife's shorts."

"Oh, I was," Mike nodded enthusiastically. "And you don't see me walking away either, do you?"

Bernard and I both laughed at his exuberance as the elevator let us out onto Mary's floor.

But our laughter died down when we entered the apartment and found Mary slipping on a blazer. On our last trip up, she'd been dressed in shorts and a t-shirt, just like the other women, but now she looked ready for work.

"What's going on?" I asked her, watching as she strapped on her weapon.

"I have to go into work."

"Today? You haven't even started yet."

"I just got a call. There's apparently some kind of issue going on at the office," she said vaguely.

I wasn't sure what that meant.

I mean, in her job, I expected there to be a degree of secrecy, but I hadn't figured out yet when she was being purposely secretive as opposed to her truly not knowing.

"Be careful," I told her as I hugged her goodbye.

"I'm going to the office," she said casually.

Okay, so this time her ambiguity was because she really didn't know.

We were definitely going to have to work out some kind of system.

"Besides," she continued. "I'm always careful."

I raised an eyebrow at her, remembering how she'd burst into that house in Denver with guns blazing in an effort to rescue me.

"I'm usually careful," she amended, and then she kissed me firmly. "I'll call you later."

I watched her leave, and then headed into the living room to grab Mary's laptop.

I brought it back into the kitchen where the others had taken seats at the table.

I liked feeling useful in a room full of cops.

I mean, I'm good at what I do.

_Really_ good.

But I hadn't forgotten about the rush I'd felt when I helped Mike and the others take down Rhonda Hagen.

Maybe I'm not completely over my adrenaline-junkie ways, but at least now I could get my fix through helping out with investigations instead of hooking up with a couple of teenage beauty queens.

Because like I'd said to Mike – that lifestyle didn't appeal to me anymore.

So I pulled up information on all of the banks in the Caymans, and then I started at the top of the list.

"Okay, Carolyn. Let's find your money."

TBC...


	64. Chapter 64

**Lupo POV**

* * *

><p>Last night, I slept like a baby.<p>

Without my gun under the mattress.

It was the first time in a long time that I was able to close my eyes without seeing potential bad scenarios unfold in my mind.

Connie and I had stayed at the hospital with Mulder until after eleven.

"_Shit, man, this getting shot business sucks."_

That was one of the first things he'd said, and I can't begin to express my relief to hear his trademark vernacular, after worrying for nearly twenty-four hours that we might lose him.

"_Been there, done that, my friend,"_ I told him as I sat down in the chair next to the bed.

Connie was right next to me, and his eyes bounced back and forth between the two of us.

Mike and Carolyn had left a few minutes ago. They'd stayed long enough to see Mulder open his eyes, but while he worked to shake the cobwebs, they'd slipped out.

"_So did you get the guy? Carl? Is he dead?"_

"_He's dead,"_ Connie said.

"_And you didn't get hurt?"_ he asked her, looking over her carefully.

"_You and Lupo protected me,"_ she told him. "_I'm fine."_

"_So, how're you feeling?" _I asked him.

He seemed fairly perky, considering what he'd just been through. They probably had some good drugs pumping through his veins.

"_Dude, like I got shot in the back,"_ he said, and I was amazed that he was able to joke about it. _"I'm gonna have a bitching scar, right?"_

I smiled and nodded at him and said, "_And chicks dig the scars, right, Connie?"_

"_Why do you think I wanted to go out with you?_" she replied.

Mulder chuckled and then winced and so I decided that it was time to call in the nurse.

She came in and checked him over and then got the doctor, who checked him over again.

"_You know these two saved your life,"_ the doctor told Mulder. I shook my head, hoping to discourage him from telling the story, but he obliviously continued. _"They gave you CPR until the paramedics got there. If it weren't for them…"_

He trailed off when Mulder's eyes teared up and he turned his head to look at us.

"_For real? Dude…"_

I started to say something, anything, to change the topic, but then Mulder smiled and looked at Connie and said, "_So you gave me mouth to mouth?"_

We stayed for several hours, until the nurse came in and administered a drug into his IV and told us that it would put him out for the night.

"_We'll be back in the morning,"_ I promised him as I got up to leave.

"_Bring your laptop,"_ he replied.

"_You're not working from the hospital_," I argued.

"_Carolyn needs my help_," he insisted, even as his eyes began to droop.

"_You just worry about getting better, okay? We'll see you tomorrow."_

So we'd left, and gone straight home and into bed.

I think I was out as soon as my head hit the pillow.

When I woke up, the sunlight was filtering in through the bedroom window and Connie was pressed fully against my back.

Her arm was thrown over my side, with her hand resting on the mattress in front of me. I looked down and saw the diamond ring sparkling on her finger.

I could hardly believe it when Bernard and Hayes had shown up with it yesterday afternoon. I mean, I knew that Connie said he'd put it in his pocket, but I couldn't believe that it was still there the next day.

She'd been teasing me lately about the fact that I didn't want to elope.

And I had to admit that the idea was tempting, but still…she deserved better than that. She deserved to have all of our friends around us, and her brother, too, while we committed our lives to each other.

How were we supposed to do that if we flew to Vegas?

I figured that she'd move on from the idea, now that Carl was accounted for. He'd been the one to make her want to rush things forward anyway.

The crazy bastard.

If I hadn't already killed him, I'd like to kill him again.

I let my mind wander for a few minutes, enjoying the peacefulness and comfort of our bed, but then my arm started to throb so I eased from beneath her grasp and got up from the bed.

"Where're you going?" Connie mumbled without opening her eyes.

"I just needed to move."

"You didn't have to get out of bed to move."

"I didn't want to wake you."

She rolled over onto her back, now opening her eyes to look at me.

"I'm awake," she said with a smile. "And I slept really well. You?"

"Uh huh," I agreed as I sat back down on the bed. I reached out to touch her knee and then trailed my fingers upwards from there.

"It feels like I've been living in a fog for more than a week now," she admitted. "And it's finally lifted."

"I know what you mean. I feel so out of touch with everyone. I've been so absorbed in catching the guy."

"And you did," she said, taking hold of my wandering hand and tugging on it, encouraging me to lay down on top of her.

As if I needed encouraging.

I stretched out over her, careful to keep from putting too much weight on her.

"It's such a relief that it's all over, isn't it? I mean, I can take Otto for a walk all by myself if I want to."

"But you're not going to," I pointed out as I kissed her neck.

"I'm not?"

"Well, not just yet."

An hour later, she _did_ take Otto for a walk. He'd spent last night at the neighbor's again, but Connie went up to get him and then she took him out while I took a much-needed shower.

I covered my bandage in saran wrap and then stood under the hot spray for nearly half an hour.

"You okay?"

Connie's voice permeated my thoughts and I pulled back the curtain to look at her.

"Yeah. How was the walk?"

"Otto missed me, I think. And my foot doesn't feel too bad. I may be able to get back into my heels in a few days."

"Good. And the stomach?"

"Better than the foot," she stated. "Lauren just called a few minutes ago."

"What did she want? Is everything okay?"

"She sounded fine. But she also asked if she and I could get together this afternoon. She said she wants to talk with me about something."

"Something like what?"

"I don't know, Lupo," she said in amusement. "I guess I'll find out when we get together. I'm going to meet her at three at the café on Third."

"Did she say anything about Bernard?"

"No, but they looked okay yesterday."

"I know. I just…feel guilty, I guess. He's been going through something and I've been completely AWOL."

"So call him and meet him this afternoon."

So that's what I did.

I made arrangements with Bernard, and then Connie and I went back to the hospital to see Mulder.

He looked even better this morning than he did yesterday.

"So tell me why your parents aren't here," I said carefully after Connie left us alone so that she could get some coffee.

"Man, Lupo…they don't do hospitals, okay?"

"No, it's not okay. You're their son."

"My mom called," he said.

"She did?"

"This morning. I guess she called to check on me, so the nurse put her through."

"Okay, that's great. But where is she? I mean, you're going to get out of here in a few days. Can you go home?"

"Yeah, dude…shit. I can go back to the crib, right?"

"Are you sure?"

"I get that you're worried, but dude…it's not that they don't care. They just can't deal, right? I mean, they've been this route and it was a dead end, you know what I'm saying?"

I stared at him blankly for a minute while my over-taxed brain pondered his statement, but he let me off the hook.

"I had a brother, okay? Two years ago, he was in a car wreck, and he lived for a week in the hospital before they had to pull the plug."

"Mulder, I'm sorry," I said with genuine sympathy. "I had no idea."

"It's okay, dude. I know you didn't know. But so the rents just can't deal. And I'm okay with it."

And he really did seem mostly okay with it, but what if Connie and I hadn't been spending time here? Then he'd be alone, and maybe he was twenty-one or twenty-two or however old he was, but he was still a kid on the inside, and being laid up in the hospital was bad enough, but being laid up alone…

"Look who I found."

I turned towards the door, and there stood Connie, along with Mulder's mom.

She looked like hell.

His mom, I mean. Not Connie.

She glanced nervously around the room and then her gaze settled on Mulder.

"Norman, I'm sorry I didn't come sooner," she said as she slowly came into the room.

I'd almost forgotten that his real name was Norman. He looked at me with slight embarrassment.

"It's okay, Mom."

"And you," the woman said almost accusingly. "I thought you were a cop."

"I _am_ a cop."

"Then how come you let my boy get shot?"

"Mom…"

"I'm sorry, Mrs…Mrs…ma'am," I said, realizing that I wasn't sure of Mulder's last name. "It just…"

"It wasn't Lupo's fault, Mom. He saved my life," Mulder interrupted. "And Connie, too."

His mother came to a halt in front of where I stood, and then she abruptly pulled me into her embrace, smothering me against her sizeable girth.

"Thank you," she told me.

And then she roughly let me go and pushed past me so that she could sit on the edge of Mulder's bed.

She immediately picked up his hand and started fussing over him.

"We're…um…going to head on out, Mulder," I told him, and then I reached in my pocket and pulled out the disposable cell phone that I'd picked up this morning. Mulder's hadn't survived the shooting incident, and I wanted him to be able to get in touch with me. "Take this. I put all of our numbers in it, so just text me or Connie…or anyone…whenever you need something, okay?"

Mulder thanked me for the phone, and then Connie and I left him alone with his mother.

"How did you know who she was?" I asked Connie as we headed for the elevator.

"She was pacing outside of his room. And didn't you notice the resemblance? The brow…the cheekbones…"

"My non-cop wife," I said affectionately, picking up her hand and bringing it to my lips.

"Wife?" she asked with a grin.

"You still want to be married to me, right?"

"Of course. I'm sure there's a chapel in here somewhere," she teased.

"We're doing it right," I insisted.

"And yet you're still calling me your wife," she said with a smile, clearly enjoying the fact that I'd used the term.

"Hey, if Bernard thinks it…"

"Uh huh. And you told him our first date story?"

"You told your girlfriends about it," I reminded her.

"That's different."

"How?"

"Because…well…because…"

"You actually win cases with that ineloquent rhetoric?" I teased.

She nudged me with her shoulder, but she was smiling broadly.

"I'm just saying…now what do you think Bernard is thinking about when he looks at me?"

"He'd better not be thinking about _that_. I'd bet that Lauren gives him enough to think about."

"Good point," she agreed, and then her phone started buzzing, so she pulled it from her pocket.

"It's a text from Alex," she told me. "She wants to know the Maryland statute on searches of college dormitories."

"Those two don't believe in taking a day off, do they?" I commented as she typed her text reply. "Are they back in Baltimore?"

"I don't know," she said.

"But they can ask for the search, right?"

"And you like to say you slept through law school," she replied with a smile. "If they can convince the RA assigned to the hall that the student in question has drugs or some other substance that's harmful to the learning process, then yes, they can definitely have it searched without a warrant. They just can't search it themselves."

"Except they're investigators in Maryland, not cops," I pointed out. "That changes things, right?"

"If they're acting as agents of the university…then it becomes questionable. It's a really gray area and courts tend to go back and forth over it. Ultimately, the search should only be conducted for the purpose of procuring evidence used in an internal disciplinary hearing as opposed to any kind of criminal proceedings, but it's possible that if the RA finds questionable material, then that information can be added to the official application for a search warrant, and…you probably didn't want to hear all of that, did you?"

"You're just trying to impress me after I questioned your eloquence."

"Did it work?"

"I'm overwhelmed by your brilliance," I told her, leaning over to kiss her firmly. I pulled back and said, "So what are you telling them?"

"That it's better to try catching the student off guard. If they show up at the kid's door and say, '_we're going to come in and look around – is that okay_?' then nine times out of ten the kid will say _yes_, just as a programmed response, and then he's just essentially waived his fourth amendment rights."

"You're dangerously smart, do you know that?"

"I have my moments," she replied as we exited the hospital.

It was only one-thirty, so we had another hour and a half before our respective afternoon meetings.

"Want to go have a moment now?" I suggested.

"Of being smart?"

I wrapped my arm around her shoulder and hugged her to me as we walked across the parking lot.

"Of being ravaged and worshipped until you forget your own name," I whispered into her ear.

"Didn't we just do that this morning?"

"Is that a no?"

"That's a _I'm impressed_. And it's definitely a yes."

TBC...


	65. Chapter 65

**Alex POV**

* * *

><p>"Jeremy, do you remember our talk Friday?"<p>

"No."

"Are you sure?"

"I don't remember."

"What about yesterday?"

"Yeah, I think so."

Bobby and I sat quietly on the far side of the room while Skoda worked with Jeremy. Ross and Liz were observing, too, and Jeremy had okayed everyone's attendance.

Skoda had bypassed the fireside chat and instead moved straight on to hypnosis.

I've never actually seen anyone go under, and it was fascinating, but my response was nothing compared to Bobby's.

He was flat-out entranced.

"_We're going to walk backwards,"_ Skoda had said gently. _"What did you do ten minutes ago?"_

"_I was talking with the Gorens in the kitchen."_

"_Good. What about an hour ago?" _

"_Um…I took a shower and then I had breakfast."_

It went on from there until Jeremy was back to waking up in the hospital Friday night. By this point, his answers were nearly robotic, as though everything was occurring on autopilot.

Skoda hesitated for a few minutes while Jeremy just sat, looking calm and comfortable, and then the doctor started again, going back to their session yesterday.

"So tell me what we talked about," Skoda said.

"We talked about Liz."

"That's right," Skoda said with a nod, looking over at me and Bobby. "What about her?"

"I said that I didn't want her getting into trouble. That she shouldn't have lied for me. But that it made me feel loved."

He _was_ remembering Friday.

He only _thought_ it was Saturday.

This was good news on many levels.

"You feel that way because she _does_ love you," Skoda said reassuringly. "And it's okay, because she didn't get into trouble."

"But she shouldn't have lied," he said, his voice sounding childlike. "She never lies."

"Because lying is wrong," Skoda agreed. "But sometimes we do it to protect the ones we love. Have you ever lied to protect someone?"

"Yes. I lie to my brother."

"Why is that?"

"Because I don't want him to be like me."

"You're a straight-A student," Skoda reminded him. "You're not a good role model?"

"I've done things…things I don't want him to do."

"Everyone has to make their own mistakes. We can't only learn from others."

"I've learned from my dad."

I noticed that Ross stiffened slightly, and I wondered why he was afraid of what Jeremy might say.

Was it because we were in the room?

Or just because he was afraid in general of his son's thoughts about him?

"I'm sure you've learned a lot from your dad. Are you thinking of something specific?"

"He made a mistake marrying my mom."

"But they had you and your brother. How can that be a mistake?"

"I guess, but…I still wish he would've met Liz first."

"So you think your attraction to a certain type of woman is a direct result of learning from your father's mistake?"

"Yeah. I mean, it should be the total package, not just looks. Most guys my age don't get that."

"But you do?"

"I can appreciate a beautiful woman. But that's not what made me fall in love with Kelly."

"Okay. Good, Jeremy. So let's go back and talk about our session."

"Yesterday?"

"If you want. Or Friday. Tell me something else we talked about."

"You have a thing for Alex."

Skoda flashed his eyes over to mine briefly, shaking his head as though denying that those words had been said, but at the same time, he looked flustered.

"That's not exactly what I said, Jeremy."

"You said that she's attractive. And you asked me if I thought Bobby would beat you up if he found out."

"Right. And this conversation took place on Friday, so I know the information is in your head. We finished our session and your dad came in to tell us that Kelly's case had been closed. Kenny killed her and then killed himself."

"But that's not true," Jeremy argued.

"Because you know that Kenny didn't kill her?"

"Because I remember the voice."

"The laughter?"

"No, the voice. She said _put it in his hand_."

Bobby and I both sat up a little straighter.

"What else did she say?"

"Kenny was yelling at her, and she told him to shut up."

"Who's she?"

"She was waiting for me on the sidewalk."

"Here? At your house?"

"Yeah. And then…I don't know what happened. But there was this red flashing light and I couldn't stop looking at it."

"Like the light on top of a police car?"

"No," he replied vaguely.

"So this woman who was waiting for you…she's the same one who was in the room with you and Kelly a week ago Friday night?"

"Yes. She said she loves me."

"Who said that? Kelly? Last Friday night?"

"Yes, but that's not what I mean. Cierra said it, too."

Finally.

Confirmation.

I mean, I _knew_ it, but still…

"When did she tell you that?"

"It wasn't just once. She kept saying it over and over, and then she wanted me to repeat it."

"Okay. And what else did she say?"

"She said that she…that she wanted me to…"

"Don't censor yourself, Jeremy. You're just repeating her words."

"Liz doesn't like me to curse. She says that it shows a lack of understanding of the English language because there are so many other expressive words that can be used instead."

I heard Bobby chuckle beside me, and I glanced over at Liz. She was looking at Jeremy with an indescribable expression, one mixed with pride and surprise.

Skoda looked at Liz, too, and gave her an encouraging nod.

"Sometimes those are the only words that work," she told Jeremy. "Tell us what she said."

"She said she wanted me to fuck her, and that if I would've done it sooner, Kelly might still be alive. I told her that she'd have to kill me first, and she said that could be arranged."

"So she threatened you because you didn't want to have sex with her?" Skoda clarified.

"Yeah. And then she said that Kelly had brainwashed me, and that maybe I just needed a little more time."

"And?"

"And that if I told anyone what we talked about, then my stepmother might get hurt."

He stopped suddenly, and looked around the room for the first time, as though he'd just remembered that we were all sitting there.

"She asked if I thought my dad's career could withstand a scandal," he continued as he carefully studied his father's face.

The session lasted another hour as Skoda rehashed some of Jeremy's statements in an effort to confirm continuity and then he finally wrapped it up.

"We'll meet again tomorrow, Jeremy," he said. "You're making tremendous progress."

The others got up and headed towards the foyer, walking Skoda to the door and saying their goodbyes, but Bobby and I stayed in our seats while I checked my voice mail.

I had a missed call from the Baltimore PD.

"So, are we going to Baltimore?" Bobby asked me quietly.

"They said don't bother. It's apparently tougher to get a warrant in Baltimore than it is in New York," I grumbled.

"You think it's that, or that they just don't care because they insist the case is closed?"

"I'm not sure," I admitted. "But you know, it's on campus. Maybe we can get campus security to search her room."

"And have it be admissible? I don't know."

"I'll send Connie a text," I decided, because as much as I wanted to nail Cierra, I also wanted her to actually go to jail for her crimes, and I definitely didn't want her to skate just because Bobby and I were trying to circumvent the letter of the law.

I quickly typed in my question and it only took her a moment to respond.

"She seems to think we should just ask," I told Bobby.

"There's an interesting idea. Why didn't I think of that?"

I smirked at him and said, "She thinks college kids are likely to say yes when asked in a leading manner. Otherwise, campus security can search the room, but only for evidence relating to university offenses."

"You mean like possession of ketamine?"

"Yeah," I agreed. "But then they'll just kick her out of school. And I'd be really surprised if she's not smart enough to hide her stash somewhere else. She's not new to this game of manipulation and hide and seek."

"You're right about that. Okay, so we'll knock on her door and ask, which means we don't need to go down until tomorrow."

"That's what I'm thinking."

"I want to go with you."

We looked up to see that Jeremy was standing in the middle of the living room. I could still hear Ross and Liz chatting with Skoda in the foyer, but he'd evidently come back to see what we thought of the session.

"I'm not sure that's a good idea."

"Yes, it is. She'll let me in her room. And then I can do the search."

"But…"

"I'm a civilian, doing a little snooping in a residence that I was _invited_ into. Anything I find, I can turn over to the cops and it's admissible since I'm not acting as an agent of the police."

"Going into her dorm room is exactly what she wants."

"Which is why it'll work. I'll tell her that I thought more about what she said. I'll let her think that her brainwashing technique worked. I mean, it almost did, so that wouldn't be much of a stretch, right?"

"It's dangerous. What if she drugs you again? You came out okay this time, but if she'd given you a heavier dosage, or not taken you to the hospital…"

"So I'll be sure not to drink anything. It's not like she'll try to inject me with something or anything. Besides, you guys will be there. You can wait outside the dorm, and give me a set amount of time. If I'm not back out, you can come up and knock on her door."

While I was pondering Jeremy's proposal, Bobby tapped me on the shoulder and then just stared at me meaningfully.

He was on to something.

"What?" I asked at last.

"She videotaped it," Bobby he responded.

"What?"

"The red flashing light," he explained, finally releasing my gaze so that he could look at Jeremy. "You said you were focused on a red flashing light. The record light on a camcorder."

Jeremy nodded slowly, and said, "Yeah. That's it. Shit. That's why she said she could ruin my dad's career. She's probably got me on tape, looking stoned out of my mind."

Bobby looked back at me, and I knew that his adrenaline was pumping because mine was, too.

We were getting close.

"Uh huh, and she'd want to keep it somewhere accessible. I bet she's been watching it, trying to determine what her next step should be."

"And she's too smart to leave something like that on her computer."

"Data stick?"

"That's my guess."

"So that's it," Jeremy agreed. "We'll go down there, I'll get into her room, and then I'll steal her data stick."

"You make it sound easy, but it's not just going to be sitting around in plain sight."

"No," he said with a smile. "But I know what it looks like, so I've got a pretty good idea of where she'd put it."

As much as I hated dangling Jeremy in front of a sociopath, I also had to admit that his idea was a good one, and it had real potential.

And it only took twenty minutes or so to talk Ross into it.

"I'll come, too," he said at last.

"Dad, you've missed too much time already. Go to work. I'll be safe with the Gorens."

"I know, but…"

"I need to do this," he insisted. "I need to take my life back. Please."

Ross looked skeptical, so Jeremy added, "Besides, she's not going to do anything to me on campus."

"You mean like she didn't do anything to Kelly? Or Kenny?"

The two of them stared at each other for a moment and then Ross looked at me and Bobby, the worry evident on his face.

"We'll have his back," I promised.

In the end, he relented.

We told Jeremy that we'd pick him up at seven, and then we went back to our car.

Bobby's phone buzzed as I was starting the engine.

"It's a text from Mike," he told me. "It looks like they've got a lead on Carolyn's account."

"How? I thought they were going to Mary's."

"I don't know. Let me find out where they are," he said as he typed a reply. After another minute, he said, "They _are_ at Mary's. Let's go over there, since our road trip got postponed. We haven't seen her place yet anyway."

It was nearly two-thirty by the time I pulled into a parking space two blocks away from Mary's apartment building.

And _Lauren's_ apartment building, I reminded myself.

I wondered if it felt weird for them to be living in the same building. I'm not sure I'd like that.

I mean, I love my friends, but I love my privacy, too.

I took Bobby's hand as we crossed the street and went up the stairs. I started to buzz Mary's apartment, but then the lobby doors came open.

"This place is starting to feel like 1PP," Bernard commented as he held the door open so that we could go inside. "The Logans…the Gorens…if the chief shows up, I'm going to have to ask Lauren to move."

"Or you two could just hang out at your place," I suggested with a smirk. "What are you doing here anyway?"

"Really?" he asked, as though he couldn't believe I'd asked the question. He tilted his head to stare at me while he flipped his keys around in his hand.

"Not in the building," I clarified. "In the _lobby_. What, are you casing the place?"

"Lauren went to get her keys," he said on a chuckle. "We're on our way out."

Bobby made a pointed stare at the keys in Bernard's hand.

"Do you two ever quit being cops?" Bernard asked in feigned annoyance, but I just raised my eyebrow at him so he let out a long-suffering sigh and said, "She went to get _her_ keys because we each have somewhere to be."

And I know. It wasn't any of my business, but it was fun giving him a hard time, so I spent a few more minutes teasing him until Lauren came down on the elevator and the two of them were on their way.

"It looks like you got your wish," I told Bobby as we stepped on the elevator.

"Which one is that?"

"Lauren and Bernard worked it out. He looks happy. And he's still wearing the same suit from two days ago, so…"

"Maybe he just forgot to go to the cleaners."

"_Or _he's been here the whole time and hasn't bothered to go home."

"She needs to give him some closet space," Bobby stated with practicality as I knocked on Mary's door.

Carolyn opened the door almost immediately, looking fired up and ready to go.

"Come on back to the kitchen," she said.

"Where's Mary?" I asked when we entered the kitchen to find only Mike and John.

"She got called into work." John answered.

"On a Sunday?"

"Where have you two been all morning?" Mike challenged with a knowing grin.

"Well…working, but…"

"Exactly. So pull up a chair. You're not going to believe what we found."

TBC...


	66. Chapter 66

**Carolyn POV**

* * *

><p>It was funny that I'd never once considered John as an asset, as far as our investigative work went.<p>

He was a business man.

He conducted million-dollar takeovers and acquisitions.

So why didn't I think about the fact that he must know a lot about the banking world?

I have no idea, but I'm so glad he offered to help us out because Mike and I had spent far too many hours searching for the exact thing that John found in two hours.

"Dumb luck," he shrugged when the latest bank manager put him on hold. "If it had been at a bank where I have no ties…"

"Don't be humble," I told him. "You've gotten half a dozen men to give you information that's not supposed to be revealed."

"Wait and see if he confirms it first," he responded.

But I knew we had it.

The manager stated that it was a numbered account, opened a little more than five years ago, with a current balance of just over fourteen million dollars.

The mailing address was presently a PO Box in New York, but until two months ago, the statements had been sent to an Asheville PO Box.

How many people who banked in the Caymans using numbered accounts had recently moved from North Carolina to New York?

Exactly.

Mike sent Bobby a text to let him know we had a lead.

He was excited, just like me, and I found it sweet that his response to excitement was to want to share it with Bobby.

"They don't have to go to Baltimore," Mike said after Bobby replied. "They're coming here."

"Good. They can help us decide what to do next, once we get confirmation."

"If we can get it," John reminded me, the phone still plastered to his ear.

"If. I know."

I studied him while he sat on hold, and I thought about my earlier conversation with Mary.

"_He wants to marry me,"_ she'd said.

"_He asked you?"_

"_Well, no,_" she admitted. "_But he said that he's headed in that direction."_

She'd been standing at the counter, debating about which set of dishes to keep since she'd apparently brought three full sets from Albuquerque, but as she told me her news, she stopped staring at the plates and shifted her attention to me.

"_What do you think?" _she asked cautiously_._

"_About John?"_

"_About marriage."_

"_I think the better question is what do you think."_

"_I'm completely freaked out."_

I'd chuckled lightly at her honesty while she stared at me nonplussed.

"_Mary…he didn't get down on one knee. He just told you that he's thinking about it."_

"_No, you don't get it,"_ she said, glancing in the direction of the bedroom where John and Mike had gone a few minutes earlier. "_I'm not freaked out about _that_. I'm freaked out that I'm _not _freaked out! I mean, what's wrong with me?"_

"_What's wrong with you that makes you no longer opposed to marriage? I'd say you're in love."_

"_Oh, but that's just…so…"_

"_Not you?"_

"_Exactly."_

"_Yeah, well, it wasn't me either, but look at me now." _

"_So how did you adjust?"_

"_It wasn't really an adjustment. That's how I knew it was right. I'm still me, only I think maybe a little better."_

She'd stared at me for another minute, and then shook her head.

"_I need to work off some of this sappiness. And what the hell are they doing in there?"_

She'd called them back into the kitchen and ordered them to start carrying boxes and our bonding time was over.

But I was happy to hear that she was on the same page with John.

He'd spent so much time mourning for Heidi that I'd really hate to see him suffer another heartbreak.

Not that I thought Mary would hurt him on purpose, but she'd been single for a long time and I had a feeling that only the exact right guy would ever make her want to change the status quo.

And I was really glad that John was that guy.

I continued to watch him hopefully as he sat back in his chair and switched the phone from one ear to the other.

"Look, Peter…it's not that difficult. I know your bank maintains copies of the ID used to secure an account. Just pull the documentation…I know…I know…it's my sister-in-law. Yeah, sure, look at it and tell me if I'm right. Carolyn…"

He stopped talking and glanced at me and I realized that he was waiting for me to supply my last name.

"Barek," I told him, and it was strange how foreign the name felt to me now. I mean, Mike used it from time to time when we were working, but for the most part, I'd been strictly Logan for several months.

"Carolyn Barek. Check it out, and tell me if it's her…no, I know you don't have to. Just like I don't have to maintain an account with your bank…okay. Yes, I'll hold."

"Look at you, playing the hard ass," Mike teased.

"I haven't started that yet," John told him. "This guy acts like he's in Switzerland or something. Which, by the way, it's a good thing this Jack character didn't open an account there, or this might've been a lot more difficult."

"Maybe that's why he didn't," I posed.

John raised an eyebrow at me, and so I clarified, "Because if it's harder to track, it probably also has more stringent regulations when it comes to opening the account. I mean, how did he get this thing opened in my name anyway?"

"He had to have had ID."

"But for me. How could a man open an account using a woman's ID?"

"He could've paid a local twenty bucks to walk in and open it," John said rationally. "Anyone remotely resembling you could've pulled it off. Hell, when I was seventeen, I borrowed a buddy's ID to get into a bar. He had blonde hair and blue eyes and the bouncer never looked twice."

"Yeah, but I'd like to think banking has a better a checks and balances system than a nightclub."

"Only for withdrawals. That's why he's hit a snag. It was a cinch to start it up and make deposits, but now he needs the face on the ID to get it out, and close isn't going to cut it when the pot's fourteen mil."

I nodded thoughtfully as I tried to decide our best course of action once this account was confirmed as mine.

"Yeah, I'm still here Peter," John said.

Mike cast me a look, holding my gaze and slowly nodding his head, and I started to feel his excitement.

I wanted Jack to go down so badly.

And not just for what he'd done to me, but for everything else he'd done that he'd managed to skate on. His wife, Slater's wife, the poor kid in Asheville who had stumbled onto their counterfeiting scam…Jack had a list of offenses under his belt that made it obscene to think he was still walking around.

"Send it to me," John was saying. "And I may need you again, so don't go too far, okay? Yeah, I know it's Sunday, but you've got a case of identity fraud going on in your bank, so I'm guessing you'd like to handle it as quickly and quietly as possible."

John's laptop pinged, indicating an incoming email, so I walked around the table and looked over his shoulder as he clicked on the attachment.

It was my military ID.

One that I thought I'd lost.

I'd been pretty upset about it at the time, because I considered that to be unacceptable carelessness on my part, but Jack had brushed off my concern.

"_It happens all the time, Corporal,"_ he'd told me. "_Take a few minutes and go over to personnel so that you can get a new one."_

At the time, I was off of active duty, but I still had to report in once a month for reserve duty. Jack was on temporary assignment in the same duty station, and he was assigned as my CO, and so I'd gone to him about the lost ID, prepared for a full dressing-down despite the fact that we were currently wrapped up in an illicit affair.

After he casually dismissed my unease, he'd gotten up from his desk and closed his office door before pinning me against it.

"_Unless you want me to punish you,"_ he'd said huskily. _"Is that it? Are you looking for absolution?"_

"_I just hate that I did something so careless_," I told him, turning my head so that he could kiss my neck.

And there we stood, each of us in uniform in his office, and we'd made out like teenagers at a drive-in movie.

It was stupid and reckless and thinking back on it now, it made me sick to my stomach.

That particular incident happened two weeks after we started our affair.

Two weeks, and yet he'd stolen my ID.

Why?

Was that when he took the hair, too?

God, he was a psychopath even back then and I never guessed it.

I took a step back from the table and paced around the kitchen for a minute, trying to get my bearings.

I mean, this didn't change anything. I had to know that it would be something like this, although I'd assumed that maybe he'd fabricated an ID.

But he'd stolen it twenty years ago.

"Carolyn?"

"Yeah, I'm fine," I assured Mike. "I'm just thinking."

"Think out loud," he encouraged as he came up behind me and wrapped his arms around me.

"It's a little disturbing, don't you think?"

"That he has your military ID?"

"Yeah. I know when I lost it. Or I guess when he _stole_ it. We'd been together for a couple of weeks."

"How much longer did it last?"

"Not much."

"Maybe he knew it was coming and he wanted something to remember you by," he suggested soothingly. "Hey, the important thing is that _we can get him_."

I took a deep breath, reminding myself that he was right.

It didn't matter what he'd done.

It mattered what we were going to do about it.

"Okay. Yeah, okay. So now we know where the account is. What does that do for us? What are our options?"

"Well, for starters, now we get to screw him six ways to Sunday," Mike said enthusiastically. "And he's going to spend the next twenty years behind bars."

"Or we can set him up for something more," John posed.

I'd almost forgotten that he was even in the room with us, since he'd gone quiet while I had my understated panic attack.

But I was past that now.

Mike was right.

We had him.

And I was curious to hear John's idea.

"Something more like what?"

"Well, we have access to the money, right? So we can pretty much make it look like whatever we want."

"But it's probably stolen money, and it's more than likely got my name tied to it," I reminded him.

"Uh huh. But what if we _un_tie your name. And…you know, maybe I'd better not say. I mean, you guys are cops."

"What are you thinking?" Mike asked with a slow smile.

"Mike…"

"No, he started this," Mike said. "Jack's had you jumping through hoops for more than a week now, and he's got you on the hook for this money. I'm open to suggestions, aren't you?"

"I'm not saying that we do anything illegal per se," John clarified. Then he and Mike both looked up at me with the eager anticipation of a kid about ready to set off fireworks. It was infectious.

"Let's hear it."

But before he said anything, there was a knock on the door, so I hustled into the other room to let Bobby and Alex in.

"Come on back to the kitchen," I said.

"Where's Mary?" Alex questioned, looking around the kitchen.

"She got called into work." John answered.

"On a Sunday?"

"Where have you two been all morning?" Mike asked them.

"Well…working, but…"

"Exactly. So pull up a chair. You're not going to believe what we found."

"Wow…that's you," Bobby said as John showed them the digital copy of my photo ID.

"Uh huh. That's how he opened the account."

"So you found it?" Alex asked with interest.

"John found it."

"So what are we going to do about it?"

"The way I see it, is that we have a few options," John said, taking control of the conversation like he would a boardroom.

But considering the topic, none of us minded.

"We can make the money disappear. I mean, just gone without a trace. That'll absolve Carolyn of any wrongdoing that she's been set up for."

"But it doesn't put Jack on the hook for any of it."

"Right. Another option would be to do what he asks and put a trace on the transfer. We'll know where it goes, and then you can turn him over to the feds for lack of disclosure."

"He'll go to prison for not following through with the plea agreement," Bobby said with a nod.

"But for how long?" Mike questioned. "I was thinking he'd go away for a long time, but what'll the feds really do for an agreement violation?"

"Probably a few years," I responded.

"Exactly. And that's not going to cut it. I want this guy off the streets for good."

"We have his texts," Alex pointed out. "He's been attempting blackmail and he's clearly been hacking the police database."

"Another year. Tops," Mike said cynically.

"What else?" I asked John, ready to hear his original idea.

"We put the money in the account that he's setting up."

"Yeah, that was option two."

"Only this time, we turn over the name on the account to Homeland Security. I can make it look like previous transactions were funding terrorist operations."

"So he pays for a crime he didn't commit since he got away with the ones he did."

John shrugged and looked at each of us in turn.

"It's just an idea. If he's supporting terrorism, he won't see the light of day again."

"He'll go to Cuba," I said. "That'd be poetic."

"Um…" Bobby interjected cautiously, and I could tell he didn't like the idea of mismatched crime-for-time.

I wasn't too sure about it myself, even though it was tempting.

"_Or_ we can use it to take out a fake hit on a mobster and then let it leak," Mike suggested with a grin. "He'll be dead in a week."

"Mike," I said, chuckling and shaking my head.

"Well, either way, I think you need to get the money out. What you do with it after that doesn't have to be decided right now, but you should definitely move it to keep him from figuring out a way to get it."

"I can't get it before Jack asks me to. What if he checks on the balance? Then he'll know that I found it."

"I can take care of that for you," John promised.

"So…road trip to the Caymans?" Mike asked hopefully.

Alex nudged Bobby with her shoulder and said, "How come our road trips are never someplace tropical? Jersey…Baltimore…"

"Honey, I'll take you anywhere you want to go," he told her.

"I hate to burst your bubble, Mike, but you don't have to go down there," John said. "Peter will take care of whatever we want to have done. It'll just take a phone call."

I glanced over at Mike and he nodded his head.

The thought of being in control of fourteen million dollars made me a more than a little nauseous, but this would put us a step ahead of Jack instead of always playing catch up.

"Okay, let's do it."

TBC...

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><p><strong>AN: As Lexi Lynne so astutely pointed out, I'll be AWOL for a couple of extra days since the holiday weekend is approaching. I MAY get another one up today, but after that, it'll be Wednesday. Happy 4th of July to my readers in the States - have a safe and fun weekend!**


	67. Chapter 67

**A/N: Happy birthday to Dora87! **

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><p><strong>Mary POV<strong>

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><p>I used to love working on Sundays.<p>

Probably because I had no life.

I was either trying to escape my mother, or my sister, or Rafe…or just my house in general.

And I love my job, so it didn't really feel like work.

But today, it almost did. Well, for the first half hour or so anyway.

While I changed clothes and got instructions from Lauren on how to get to my office via the subway…it was daunting and stressing and by the time I got to work, I was in a foul mood.

But then I remembered why I do the job.

A new inductee into Witsec had to be moved pronto, and SOP was for a team to escort the witness to the airport where we'd be met by inspectors from the target city.

And because the threat level to the witness was high, the escort team was required to have a management-level marshal along for the transfer.

That was me.

And believe me, I know.

Management isn't usually a word associated with me unless you put the words _pissing off_ in front of it, but that was before.

"Inspector Shannon?" a young marshal greeted with her hand outstretched.

"Guilty as charged."

"I'm Inspector Heinz."

"Like the ketchup?" I asked, then I shook my head in irritation with my inability to keep my mouth shut. "I'm sorry. I bet you never get that, do you?"

"It's fine," she replied with a fake smile, indicating that maybe it _wasn't_ fine. "And I appreciate you coming in. Your predecessor apparently couldn't get out of here fast enough. He's on a cruise ship as we speak."

"That doesn't bode well for me."

She laughed lightly, and then tipped her head toward the two inspectors standing off to one side.

"They're part of your team."

"And you are…"

"The director's assistant," she clarified. "He asked me to make the introductions. You'll meet the others tomorrow at the morning briefing, but for now…Inspectors Holly and McInnis."

And none of the three marshals standing with me appeared a day over thirty.

But I wasn't going to judge them on their appearance.

I mean, Lauren didn't look her age either, but from all accounts, she was extremely competent.

Heinz handed me the dossier with the information pertaining to our witness and while I went over the details, Holly and McInnis slipped out of the room to fetch said witness.

"What's the urgency to get her out of town tonight?"

"We picked up word of a hit."

"Something specific?"

"It's not a secret that she's in our protection. We'll be using an airstrip on Long Island instead of a major airport."

So much for me assuring John that I was just heading into the office.

And why is it that I felt guilty as I strapped on my bullet proof vest?

He knows my job.

He knows that it can get dangerous from time to time, and yet I still had the nearly overpowering urge to call him or send him a text…something.

Just in case.

But I didn't.

Instead, I got into a large, black SUV with my new subordinates, Holly and McInnis, and our witness, who for the sake of safety will remain unnamed, and we made the trip to Long Island.

The incoming flight was delayed, and it's never a good idea to loiter around and offer up the opportunity for an easy hit, so we spent an hour driving around in the vicinity of the airstrip until we got word that the wheels were on the ground, and then we made our move.

After so much precaution, it felt anti-climactic to get the witness on board the plane without so much as a hiccup, but that kind of thinking in my line of work can get a person into trouble.

I rode in the passenger seat back to the USMS office while McInnis drove. Holly sat in the back.

"So…that went well," I said in an effort to strike up conversation.

"Uh huh," McInnis mumbled.

"Yes, ma'am," Holly replied.

"Please don't ma'am me," I said quickly.

The inspector raised her eyebrow at me, apparently awaiting further instruction.

"Inspector," I suggested. "Mary…hey, you…I answer to pretty much anything."

Neither marshal had cracked a smile since I'd met them, and I wondered what their former boss had been like.

Probably a rigid, hard-ass ball-buster.

"And you can relax," I added. "The hard part is over and our witness is safe."

McInnis flashed me a wary glance and Holly let out a quiet, steady sigh.

It was obvious that they were both extremely uncomfortable with me and I couldn't for the life of me figure out why.

"Okay, what?" I asked at last. "Is my zipper down? Do I have something in my teeth? What?"

"It's…um…" Holly began uncertainly.

She was a tiny woman, with doll-like features that would normally make me want to crush her under my thumb, but at the moment, I felt like I was at her mercy.

Sort of.

"That's a direct order," I told her. "Spit it out."

"Heinz said not to get too used to you."

"What? Why?"

"She googled you. She said you have a billionaire boyfriend and it's only a matter of time before he makes you quit your job."

I stared at her, open-mouthed, for probably a solid minute before I managed to formulate a response.

"Okay…first of all, _get_ used to me and do it fast, okay? Because I'm not going anywhere and the quicker you come around to my way of thinking the better off we'll all be. And maybe Heinz should spend more time doing her job and less time googling me. Or if she's going to do it, then she can at least get it right because my boyfriend isn't a billionaire, he's a millionaire. And he would absolutely never _make_ me quit anything. Except maybe hooking. If I was doing that, then yeah, he'd probably make me quit and I really can't blame him for that. But anything else…no."

Now it was their turn to stare slack-jawed and then finally Holly allowed herself a small smile.

"Hooking?"

"I'm not saying I _would_," I said with a shrug.

"So, you didn't just take this position in New York as a means of getting your hooks into John Strathmore?" McInnis asked. "Because we take our job seriously."

"Is that what she found on the internet?"

He nodded and looked contrite at the same time.

I hadn't run into much of the down side of dating a rich guy, but I guess this was it.

Gossip columnists had nothing better to write about.

I sighed heavily and then said, "You know what? I'll give you my whole life history at the team briefing in the morning, okay? We'll do a Q&A. It'll be fun. And then maybe we can get down to the business of being marshals instead of believing every two-bit piece of crap we read on the internet. Deal?"

By this time, we were back in the parking garage outside of the USMS office, and as soon as McInnis put it into park, I got out and headed for the exit.

I'm not sure why I was so annoyed.

Maybe because the boss' assistant was spreading gossip about me, creating a false first impression.

Or because the two marshals I'd met had sticks so far up their asses that I was concerned for their esophageal health.

Or maybe I couldn't help but wonder about the source of Heinz's information.

Had John given an interview? Or was it just some hotshot reporter trying to dig up dirt on one of the east coast's most eligible bachelors?

"Ma'am! I mean…Mary!"

I was almost to the subway station when I turned around to find Holly hustling up to me.

"I feel weird calling you by your first name," she admitted, slightly breathless from having jogged to catch up.

"Call me whatever you want. I'm from a smaller office in a more casual city, so maybe it's me who needs to adjust."

"No, it's…look, I'm really sorry about that. I think we started off on the wrong foot."

"If by that you mean it couldn't have gone much worse and now your boss hates you, then…yeah, I guess we did."

She looked at me with a horrified expression on her face until I finally cracked a smile.

"Re_lax_," I said. "I'm a smart ass. I'm not blaming you for anything other than your lack of sense of humor."

"I have a sense of humor," she said quickly.

"And a backbone," I said approvingly. "Good. And I'll give you points for being honest with me when I asked you the score, and for coming after me to make it right instead of letting it fester."

"So…am I? Making it right?"

"There's going to be an adjustment period for all of us. I just want to make sure you guys form your opinion of me based on _me_, okay?"

"Yes, ma'am," she replied. "And I'm sorry about that. And just so you know, the old boss was a stickler for formalities. I don't even _know_ his first name."

"Well, maybe that's why he was so burnt out that he had to hop the first cruise ship out of here. Look, Holly…what's your name?"

"Anna."

"Great. Anna. We're fine. Go home to…whoever you go home to, and we'll start fresh tomorrow. No hard feelings."

I waited until she nodded and then I turned back toward the subway stairs.

By the time I got back to my apartment, it was nearly seven o'clock and everyone had cleared out.

Well, except for John, of course.

But the bitch of it was that during the ride home, I couldn't stop thinking about the fact that I hadn't even officially started yet and people were already talking about me.

Spreading _rumors_ about me.

I can't stand that kind of thing, and my mood was reflective of that fact.

The apartment smelled of pizza so I made a beeline for the kitchen where I found John pulling out a bottle of beer.

"It's going to need to be something stronger," I told him gruffly, brushing past him to get to the liquor cabinet.

"Okay," he said cautiously. "So how'd it go?"

"You can't ask me about me day," I said in annoyance. I unscrewed the cap on a bottle of vodka and poured a healthy amount into a glass before I turned around to look at him. "Haven't you figured that out yet? God, John, you know that, so why are you pushing me?"

"Um…good or bad is all I was going for, but I guess I'll go with bad."

He opened the beer and took a drink before setting it on the counter and pinning me with his gaze.

He didn't say a word, but I couldn't keep from squirming, knowing that I was being a bitch to him for no reason.

In the old days, I wouldn't have cared. I would've just plowed right over anyone who tried to talk me down from it, but not anymore.

Not with John.

"It was bad," I admitted quietly. "I don't like people knowing anything about my life, and today I had my new team, inspectors working _under_ me, knowing my personal business."

"What did they say?"

"That they weren't going to bother getting used to me because my billionaire boyfriend would probably make me quit."

"What?"

"I know, right? I told them you're not a _billion_aire…"

"Well…"

"You are?" I asked sharply.

"It's been a good year for me," he answered casually.

"Oh, man! God, John…"

"You're going to be mad at me about my money? Because I'm pretty sure you knew about it before we started dating."

"John…"

"And I would never make you quit. I'd never even ask. I don't want you to quit."

"Sure, _now_. It's still this neat mystery that's only ruined a handful of plans…"

"Just like my job."

"And today, I told you I was going to the office and I ended up wearing my vest. It's a crazy job, John. And sometimes very dangerous."

"And you love it."

"Yeah."

"And I love you, so what's the problem?"

I've never had anyone be able to defuse my bad moods like he could.

I set down my glass and grabbed onto his belt loops, pulling him closer to me.

"I'm sorry. I just…I went in and tried to be this cool boss and all I got was the cold shoulder and then when I found out why…it's hard enough to go into a new office where you have to prove yourself all over again, but now it's going to be twice as hard because everyone's looking at me like I'm some gold-digging short-timer."

"I can give it all away," he suggested as he moved his hand to the back of my head, holding me securely against him.

"Your money?"

"Sure, why not? I don't need it. I've got everything I need right here."

"Now I'm _sure_ you've lost your mind."

"Because I'd chose you over money? I think I'd be crazy not to."

I relaxed against him and let out a heavy sigh. He held me close for several minutes and then when my stomach growled, he chuckled and let go of me.

"I guess you didn't get to eat, huh?"

"Not exactly. But that pizza smells incredible."

I flipped open the lid of the box and pulled out a slice.

"So you had to wear a vest?" he asked me.

"Yeah. You know, we need to set up some kind of code."

"Code?"

"You know, _x_ means I'm fine, _y _means I'm in some hairy shit so you'd better check the status of my will."

"Was today a _y_?"

"It had the potential," I admitted. "But it turned out okay."

He nodded thoughtfully and then reached for a piece of pizza.

"Do you even have a will?" he asked me with a smirk. "Because if you send me the _y_ code and I start going through your filing cabinet…"

I nudged his shoulder with mine and couldn't stop the smile.

God, he really is the perfect man for me.

"So tell me about your afternoon. Did you find Carolyn's account?"

"I did," he admitted. "And we pulled the money out on the off-chance that Jack figures out a way to get to it himself."

"But won't he know that it's gone?"

"I took care of it."

"So what's next?"

"They're weighing their options," he said, and then he briefly touched on some of their slightly illegal ideas. "And as of the time they left, Jack still hasn't been in touch, so they still have a little time to decide what they want to do."

"So this money…it was stolen or embezzled or whatever, and he made it look like Carolyn was the one who'd done it?"

"That's right."

"So…if you have the ability to manipulate the account, why not just shift the evidence so that it looks like Jack's new alias did it? He calls with the transfer instructions, she transfers the money and unbeknownst to him she transfers all of the deposit documentation, too."

"So it looks like his account was the one open for five years…the one getting deposits of stolen money."

"Exactly. Then a quick call to someone in the federal building…"

"It's so unbelievably simple. I can't believe we didn't think of it."

"You guys were too busy being Al Capone."

"Can you blame us, after what he's put them through?"

"No. And just because this is the cleanest way to do it, doesn't mean they can't still have fun with it."

"I like the way you think," he said with a nod as he tossed his crust into the now half-empty box.

"Yeah? What else do you like?"

"I like that you came home and unleashed your bad mood on me."

"You like that? Because I'm sure I can be even more bitchy if I put my mind to it."

"You said what was on your mind instead of trying to bury it. Yeah, I like that."

He wrapped his arms around me again, pushing his hips into mine as he trapped me against the counter.

"Are you sucking up so that I'll say yes when you ask me to marry you?"

"Is it working?"

"I don't know. Do it some more and I'll let you know."

TBC...

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><p><strong>AN2: Okay, this is it. No more until Wednesday.**

**A/N3: And btw, I won't be able to reply to reviews or PM's over the weekend (although I can read them), so don't think I'm ignoring you. I'll reply when I get back.**


	68. Chapter 68

**A/N: I'm back! Miss me? Anyone? Anyone? **

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><p><strong>Bobby POV<strong>

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><p>"<em>She hasn't left yet."<em>

"_Are you sure?"_

"_I'm looking at her right now."_

"_What's she doing?"_

"_She's standing in the front yard while her dog does its business."_

"_Does she look ready to go somewhere? Did she put a bag in the car?"_

"_She's in her nightie, so unless she works as a stripper, I don't think she's ready to go anywhere."_

I hung up with the cop who was assigned to sit on Cierra's house and looked at Alex.

"_She's still there."_

"_She said she was going back to school this morning."_

"_A lie surprises you?"_

"_No. I guess not. Okay, well…how do you want to play this?"_

"_We'll wait her out."_

That was this morning.

By noon when she still hadn't left, we postponed our trip until tomorrow.

"_Or I could get her to invite me out to her place,"_ Jeremy had suggested when we called to let him know.

"_It's too risky."_

"_Why? What's the difference?"_

"_Small dorm room versus mansion? No escape route versus multiple escape routes? College turf versus her own turf? Take your pick,"_ Alex said. "_It won't kill us to wait another day."  
><em>

_"So what am I supposed to do today?"_

"_Study. Talk to Skoda. And then study some more,"_ I said.

"_You sound like my old man," _he joked.

"_Good, so that makes two smart guys telling you the same thing. What does that tell you?"_

"_I'm studying,_" he replied, and I could tell that he was smiling.

Now it was two o'clock and Alex and I were sitting at our desks. Southside had authorized the release of their security footage without a warrant, so we'd spent the morning going over Friday night's ER comings and goings.

It was essentially a waste of time.

There was no sign of Cierra or the black BMW.

In fact, there wasn't even any sign of Jeremy.

"We know he was there," Alex said. "So how'd he get in?"

"They must have used another entrance."

"So he was completely blitzed and yet she walked him through the hospital and into the emergency room through the interior doors?"

"Or…" I began thoughtfully. "Or she drugged him more heavily at the last minute."

"So she walks him in and sits him down before the drugs fully kick in," Alex said with a nod. "She slips back out the way she came in and leaves him there to drift unconscious."

"It's possible."

"Let's call back out to Southside and get the footage from their other entrances. If we can make a case for a kidnapping charge, then we can haul her into 1PP and stop pussy-footing around with the BPD."

Alex picked up the phone to make the call and I turned around to see what Mike and Carolyn were up to.

I'd been conflicted after leaving Mary's apartment yesterday afternoon.

I wasn't crazy about charging Jack with crimes he didn't commit, even if the end result was the same. And maybe that's just my overinflated sense of justice, I don't know.

But the fact was that Jack had committed a lot of crimes. And if we couldn't provide evidence of those crimes, then it wasn't our job to fabricate proof.

Alex and I discussed it for awhile after we went home last night, and then we'd met up with Mike and Carolyn at Steve-O's for dinner.

I didn't bring it up because it was ultimately their decision.

It was their case.

It was their lives being effected by his crimes.

I would offer my opinion if they asked, but otherwise, I was going to keep my mouth shut.

"_Go ahead and say it,"_ Mike had said within five minutes of us sitting down the restaurant.

"_Say what?"_

"_We need to catch Jack for what he's done instead of frame him for what he hasn't done."_

"_It's your case, but yeah…that's what I think."_

"_We came to the same conclusion,"_ Carolyn agreed. "_Maybe our zealousness to catch him temporarily blinded our good judgment."_

"_It is tempting," _Alex said. _"It's even more tempting to set up a meeting with him and then just shoot him."_

"_Oh, was that one of our options?"_ Mike asked with feigned interest. _"Because that's my favorite one so far."_

I chuckled at him as I waved the waitress over to our table.

"_Or you could call one of your Westie friends_," I told him. "_I think the Irish owe us a favor or two, don't they?"_

"_At least,"_ Alex said. "_I wonder how professional of a hit we can get for fourteen million?"_

We all laughed for a minute, but then we got down to business. Because if we weren't going to fabricate evidence, then we needed to come up with a plan.

And then John called and told us about Mary's idea.

It was so ridiculously simple that I was embarrassed that none of us had come up with it.

"_I've got my guy walking through the account history tonight," _John said. _"He'll document every little transaction and then mirror it for the new account."_

"_Which means he'll be going down for exactly what he did,"_ Carolyn stated with a nod. "_And all it'll take from me is a phone call to the feds."_

"_And the Secret Service,"_ Alex added. "_You know some of that money originated from his counterfeit operation."_

"_And there won't be any deals this time around,"_ Mike said firmly.

Once that dilemma was settled, we'd all been able to relax and enjoy the evening.

Alex and I made it into bed at a decent hour, too.

"_Ten o'clock,_" she commented as we climbed under the covers_. "You know there's no way we're going to get eight hours of sleep."_

"_Are you expecting a phone call?" _I teased.

"_You're not?"_

"_Jeremy's home and Cierra's being watched," _I reminded her.

"_Jack could call Carolyn…we're on the call-out list…"_

"_When did you turn into such a pessimist?"_ I asked as I pulled her up against me.

"_I'm just stating the facts."_

"_So what do you want to do? Stay awake and wait for the phone to ring?"_

As it turned out, she had something else in mind.

And it was after eleven before we finally went to sleep, so instead of eight hours, we got seven.

But giving up an hour of sleep was well worth it, considering what she'd done to me.

"What are you grinning about, Goren?" Mike asked me, flashing me a knowing look.

"Nothing," I replied innocently. "Have you heard from John today?"

"His guy is supposed to call him by the end of the day. Any luck on your security footage?"

"No, but Alex is making arrangements to get the rest of it."

"She took him in another door?"

"Looks like it. And…"

I cut my statement short when Carolyn's phone rang and she looked at the display and then quickly said, "Jack."

I got up from my chair and went over to her desk so that I could listen in on the conversation.

Mike snapped his fingers at Jeffries and said, "Trace! Hurry up!"

The trace was really just as an added precaution and we didn't pin our hopes on the idea that it would work, but it certainly didn't hurt.

So far, we hadn't been able to track down where he was hiding out, and it would be nice to have an unmarked unit sitting on him so that he wasn't roaming freely about the city.

Carolyn paused as long as she could before answering and then she finally clicked the button, answering the call and putting it on speaker.

Alex came up beside me, having finished her call with Southside hospital security, and the two of us along with Mike anxiously watched Carolyn's face as she conducted the conversation.

"Detective Logan," she answered smoothly.

"You know I hate that name, right?"

"And I should care about that because…"

"Because I'm the one pulling the strings, darlin'. You know you could've been a Quarles, right?"

"Considering how the other Mrs. Quarles ended up, I think I made the right choice."

"That's not really a fair assessment since you're the one who killed her."

"We both know that's not true. I wonder what the penalty is for fabricating evidence."

"Well, first you'd have to prove that it's fabricated."

"You're not as smart as you think, Jack. It wasn't hard to find my way through all your bullshit. The pictures, Mike's mother, Cher…it's all crap and you know it. It's really just about the money, so why don't you cut to the chase and tell me the next step."

"You sound a little anxious. Don't you like talking to me?"

"Did you establish your new account or not?" she asked with barely masked hatred.

I liked that she didn't seem to be trying to keep him on the line.

He wouldn't consider the attempted trace since she wasn't making any effort to draw out the conversation.

She knew him well enough to know that he liked toying with her, so he'd keep things going because he was _that_ cocky.

And maybe he was right to be.

I mean, so far, we hadn't tracked him. The few leads obtained from the traced calls had all proven to be dead ends.

"It's done," he said at last. "But you know, I almost hate to see this end. Once you move that money, I'll be out of your life forever. Are you sure that's what you want?"

"Words can't express how much I want that," she replied through gritted teeth.

"Fourteen million, darlin'. That kind of money can buy a lot of happiness."

"I don't need money to be happy."

"But you could have money _and_ me," he offered.

"Give me the account information so that you can crawl back under your rock."

"You don't know what you're missing. Oh, wait. No, I guess you do know, don't you?" he asked, laughing at his own lame joke. "And you're really picking Mike over me?"

"Every single time. So are we doing this, or what?"

"Tomorrow night. Between now and then, you need to carry your sweet little ass down to the Caymans. Show them ID and establish a code so to set up internet wire transfer capabilities. Then we'll meet tomorrow night and do the deed."

"You mean we'll make the transfer."

"And any other deed you feel like doing. After all, it might be your last opportunity."

"To vomit? No thank you."

"Is Mike listening or something? Are you playing up to his ego? Or have you still not told him about us?"

"You told me not to."

"Yeah. But it might be kind of nice to watch him squirm a little."

"Let's just do this. Tomorrow night…when? And where do I go when I get to the Caymans? I need the account information."

Jack reluctantly handed over the details and then he added a threat.

"If you screw me on this, I won't just blow the whistle on where that money came from, but I'll make sure that Mike goes down, too. You got me?"

"I promise. I'm not going to screw you," she said pointedly. "Not in any way, shape, or form."

"Okay then. Tomorrow night. In the meantime, enjoy the islands."

She wasn't going to be flying anywhere, but he didn't know that. And his confirmation of the account information that John's guy had already found only solidified my confidence in our plan.

It was all coming to a head.

Tomorrow night, she'd meet with him and make the transfer.

John's contact at the bank would be on standby so that he could turn that account into a replica of the one he set up for Carolyn.

And then the feds would be all over Jack.

I couldn't wait to see him go down.

I hate guys like Jack Quarles, and I hate it even more that he was like this when he used to be a cop.

It brought a level of disgrace to the uniform that I was sick of seeing.

Jeffries, nodding and grinning like an idiot, came over to Mike and handed him a slip of paper.

Carolyn was still verbally sparring with Jack, so Alex and I quietly moved over to read the note over his shoulder.

_**Phone booth at Grand Central.**_

Mike raised an eyebrow, looking at Jeffries, and I knew what he was thinking.

What the hell was he so happy about?

It was Grand Central Station.

It's not like we were going to find him _there_.

Jeffries grabbed a pen from Mike's desk and added to the note.

_**Hotel.**_

Grand Central _Hotel_.

Mike looked at me as a slow grin spread across his face. Then he motioned to Carolyn to end the call, so she wrapped it up and then looked at us expectantly.

"Grand Central Hotel," Mike told her. "Let's go. I'd like to put eyes on him, maybe slip a GPS onto his vehicle."

"That's where the call came from?"

"Uh huh."

"Don't let him see you," I warned. "We're too close. We don't want anything to tip him off."

"We'll just do a quick look-see," Mike promised. "I won't beat his ass. Yet."

"And then when John gives us the details on the origins of the money, I'll call a friend at the Bureau," Carolyn said. "They can be waiting in the wings tomorrow night, and once the transfer's done, they can pick him up."

I knew this wasn't going to be the most gratifying end for Mike, but at least it would be an end.

"You'll be there watching," Carolyn reminded him, obviously thinking along the same lines as me.

"Maybe you'll get lucky and he'll try to run," Alex offered.

"Don't tease me, Alex," Mike replied with a grin as Carolyn pushed him toward the elevator.

"We'll be back," she called out to us. "Try to stay out of trouble."

"Why do people always assume we're going to get into trouble?" I asked Alex as we went back to our desks.

"Because we usually do," she replied. "Hey, where have Lupo and Bernard been all day? It seems awfully quiet in here."

"It's quiet because Sean's not here," I pointed out. "I wonder how things are going at the 2-7."

"I'll check in with him later."

"What did Southside say about the video footage?"

"They're sending it. He said we'll have it within the hour."

"So we have an hour to kill," I said suggestively. "We can get a lot accomplished in an hour."

"Detectives!"

I quickly sat up straight in my chair, feeling like a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar as I watched Ross cross the squad room.

"What's up, Chief?" Alex asked.

"I hate to do this to you when you've been working all weekend on my personal business, but I've got a case for you."

"No problem. We're benched on the Cierra thing until tomorrow anyway."

"Yeah, I talked to Jeremy. And I'd give this to someone else, but there's no one. I even gave Lupo and Bernard the call-out last night."

"I wondered where they were."

"Yeah, it came in around ten-thirty last night," he said, and Alex smirked at me, a look that clearly said _I told you so_.

"Lupo's back to full duty?" she asked him.

"He insisted," Ross replied. "And since another certain detective remained at full duty even while recovering from a dislocated shoulder, I'm kind of learning to trust the individual's self-assessment. Anyway, this just came in."

He handed me a slip of paper.

"Chief," I began after I read over the information.

"I know," he said, shaking his head.

"What?" Alex asked.

"We're poaching another precinct's case," Ross explained. "The victim's a major player on Wall Street, and the boss wants us to handle it."

"Poaching from…."

"The 2-7," I supplied. "Who hasn't yet been told that we're taking over."

"Tell me it's not Eames and Hayes," she said on a sigh.

"I didn't get specifics. I just know the detectives are already out at the scene. So take a drive uptown and play nice."

"We'll have to put this on hold tomorrow while we take care of that other thing."

"Tomorrow? I figured you two would have this thing solved tonight," he joked as he walked away from our desks. "But yeah, do what you have to do."

"If this is Sean, he's going to be pissed," Alex muttered to me.

"What are the odds?" I asked soothingly as we headed for the elevator. "There are a couple of dozen homicide detectives in the 2-7."

"And how many of them had a clean plate because they were just getting back this morning from three weeks at Major Case?"

"Good point. But Sean won't be mad at you. It's not your fault we have to take the case."

"True."

"And maybe we can unofficially use their help. At least until we resolve Jeremy's case."

But it wasn't Sean and Hayes.

It was a couple of old-school short-timers who didn't care for the idea of Major Case taking over and it very nearly turned ugly.

"You think this is what Carolyn meant about us staying out of trouble?" I mumbled as I worked to get my heart rate back down to normal.

One of the detectives had tried to take a swing at me, and there was no shortage of press around to document the hostile exchange.

"That guy was a prick," she scoffed heatedly. "I'm calling Van Buren."

"And we need to warn Ross about the potential bad PR," I added.

"You did good," she told me as she pulled out her cell. "I don't think I would've been able to hold back."

"You would've hit him?"

"In a second. I almost did anyway for the way he talked to you."

"I guess we won't have any help on this case."

"That's fine," she said as she held the phone to her ear. "Lt. Van Buren," she barked out, and then she said to me, "Here comes Liz. Let's work this scene and then go back to 1PP and look at the security footage, and by that time, she might have something that we can go on."

I flashed her a smile and then echoed her statement from a few days ago.

"You have a plan. You're dazzling me already."

She smiled fully and opened her mouth to respond, the content of which was surely to be something dirty, but instead Van Buren must have come on the line because she said, "Lieutenant, this is Detective Goren with Major Case."

I chuckled at her and then walked over to the body. Liz was just kneeling down beside the victim.

"What've we got, Doc?" I asked her.

"You tell me, Detective."

"No obvious signs of trauma," I remarked. "OD?"

"Uh huh. Look here," she said, tilting the victim's head to one side. "Tiny injection mark at the hairline."

"Huh," I said thoughtfully. "It's practically invisible. How'd you catch it so quickly?"

"It's just something I look for," she said dismissively. "Once upon a time, I had a case like this and I missed it, so I'm very careful not to repeat that mistake."

"I wonder if every ME is as careful as you."

"What are you thinking?"

"Kenny's death was ruled a suicide awfully quickly, largely based on the note."

"And you think the ME missed an injection site?"

"Wouldn't it be easier to get that amount of ketamine into the system through injection rather than ingestion?"

"Definitely," she agreed. "But how does that help? We already suspect Cierra of killing him."

"I don't know," I admitted. "But if she injected it, she had to get a syringe from somewhere, right? It's one more lead we can work on."

"I'll call down to Baltimore when I get back to the office."

"Good. Okay, sorry. I got sidetracked. So this guy…death by injection?"

"That's what it looks like. I'll know for sure after I get him on the table."

"She's pissed," Alex said as she came over, having finished her call with Van Buren.

"At them, I hope."

"Oh yeah. Okay, so here we have Stanley Dryden. Up and comer on Wall Street…single…no kids…and look at this," she said as she went through his wallet. She held up a picture of our victim with his arm around a thirty-something brunette and posed, "Girlfriend?"

"Mistress," I corrected as I took the picture from her hand. "Look at the indentation on her left ring finger."

"I guess that gives us suspect number one," she said. "We need to find the hottie's husband and see if he has an alibi."

"I think we already know who the husband is," I said as recognition flooded through me.

I'd recently seen the same woman in a very different picture, one displayed on the mantle of a Wainscott mansion.

"We do?" she asked, and then she looked more closely at the picture. "Oh, you're kidding me."

"What?" Liz questioned. "Who is it?"

"The hottie is Cierra Bingham's stepmother."

TBC...


	69. Chapter 69

**Bernard POV**

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><p>By three o'clock in the afternoon, I was starting to run out of gas.<p>

We'd been going non-stop since ten-thirty the night before, which meant that I hadn't gotten any sleep since the night before that.

I was starting to think that I was too old for pulling all-nighters.

I'd been at Lauren's when the call came in, after spending the late afternoon with Lupo and then making a quick trip by my place for clean clothes.

"_Your partner insists that he's fit for duty,"_ the chief said when I answered the phone. "_Are you on board with that?"_

"_Yes, sir."_

"_Good. Then I need you two to head up to Mt. Vernon."_

He'd proceeded to tell me what he knew, which was that a family had been killed in their home.

I hate these kinds of cases, and Lupo hates them even more.

It was after this exact type of case that Lupo started drinking excessively and ended up falling asleep on duty. His then-partner was shot while he slept, and he blamed himself for his partner's death.

Me, I don't think he could've done anything to stop it.

Even if he'd been awake, he wouldn't have been able to run into the coffee shop fast enough to stop the thug from putting a bullet in a cop.

But I knew that Lupo still felt guilt, and every time we ran across a similar case, he slipped into a funk.

I was close to asking the chief if he could pass the case on to the next pair in line, but then I stopped myself.

For starters, Lupo would be pissed if he found out.

Not only that, but maybe it was high time he realized that he wasn't to blame. The man liked to carry the weight of the world on his shoulders, and that kind of thing wasn't good for him.

And yeah, okay, so maybe I was feeling especially protective of him lately, but still…it didn't change the facts.

So I finished up with Ross, and then quickly told Lauren what was up.

"_It feels weird watching you get ready to go,"_ she remarked. _"Knowing that I'm not going with you."_

"_You don't want to be heading out at this time of night. Because you know the odds are slim that I'll find my way into a bed tonight."_

"_Well, if you do, it better not just be any bed," _she replied with a smile.

She was looking better than I'd seen her look since more than a week ago. It had been last Saturday night, after our dinner with the Logans, when I'd started sensing that something was off.

But now it seemed as though everything was back _on_.

She'd talked with Connie earlier in the day, giving her a heads-up that her case would be coming across her desk.

"_It gets easier every time," _she admitted after we met back in her apartment._ "And Connie was just so…I don't know. Not freaked out about it."_

"_Did you think she would be?"_

"_I don't know what I expected."_

She'd seemed baffled by Connie's response, so I'd pulled her into my arms and said, "_You need to keep reminding yourself that what happened to you doesn't change who you are."_

"_But it does."_

"_I mean, it doesn't make you a bad person, or less worthy of love or friendship."_

And at the time, I was _really_ close to telling her that I love her, but I held back.

I didn't want to catch her while she was still healing.

I didn't want her to be vulnerable to latching on to any man who loved her, since her sense of self-worth was still recovering.

So my declaration could wait.

But I still felt it, and later, when I left her at ten-thirty to go pick up Lupo, I tried to convey the sentiment as I kissed her goodbye.

And I could be wrong, but I felt like she was trying to tell me the same thing.

It was tough leaving her.

She stood there in the foyer, already dressed for bed. Her hair was loose and slightly messy and I really wanted nothing more than to pick her up and haul her off to the bedroom.

I couldn't remember a time when my home life begged for precedence over my job.

"_I'll text you later,"_ I told her. _"Get some sleep. Big first day back at the 2-7 tomorrow."_

"_I'm tempted to pull strings and get myself assigned to Major Case."_

"_I'm sure that can be arranged."_

"_Me, too. But I want to earn it."_

So I kissed her one more time and then headed out the door.

Nearly two hours later, Lupo and I were finally standing in the home of the murdered family, the Cincinellis.

Four kids and a mom and dad.

"_Looks like a hit,"_ Lupo commented after taking a deep breath and then kneeling down next to one of the kids. "_But professionals don't usually take out kids."_

"_Two to the back of the head…it's precise and calculated_."

Two of the victims, the youngest children, were in their beds. The older two children were in a downstairs den. The parents were in the main-level living room.

But they all looked like they hadn't suspected a thing.

"_The killer had to use a silencer,"_ Lupo said, clearly thinking the same thing as me.

"_He still managed to kill two people in the same room. Twice. Was he that quick, or did he have help?"_

"_Hit men usually work alone."_

"_Detectives,_" one of the CSU techs said, approaching us as we moved into the hallway. "_You need to come see this_."

We followed the tech into another room, one set up as an office. She walked around the desk to the computer and flipped it around so that it was facing us.

"_When I jiggled the mouse, this was on the screen_," she told us.

"**_One down, three to go – unless you end it now_**," I read.

"_One? More like six,"_ Lupo said. "_And end what? If he takes the time to leave a note, then why be cryptic?"_

"_Notes aren't usually left by professional hit men."_

"_So nothing says hit except the two taps to the head,"_ he said, shaking his head in frustration that the evidence didn't seem to match up.

"_You're going to take that in, right?_" I said to the tech. "_Dust every key."_

"_Of course_," she agreed quickly.

We'd spent another hour in the house and then we headed for 1PP. By that time, it was nearly two o'clock in the morning.

"_Is Connie okay home alone?_" I asked him as we made the drive.

"_She's great, now that Carl's dead."_

"_Are you okay? With this case, I mean."_

"_Yeah, everything's good,"_ he promised, then he flashed me a nervous smile and said, "_You know, honestly, more than anything else, I'm worried about…you know."_

"_Yeah,"_ I said with a nod. _"I get that."_

I pulled out my phone to send Lauren a text and he asked, "_Checking in with the missus?"_

"_Just showing a little courtesy. You might want to text Connie, too. Good manners never hurt anyone,_" I teased.

"_Yeah, well…I already did," _he answered with a grin.

We spent the pre-dawn hours researching our victims and then we went to the morgue.

The ME on duty had only finished the first autopsy, but at least now we had the caliber of bullet.

"_9 mil Parabellum_," the doc said. "_I pulled both rounds from the victim's head, and sent them over to ballistics. Maybe you'll get lucky and you'll get a match."_

We didn't.

We spent our day talking to associates of Mr. Cincinelli, trying to determine if he was into anything that might have triggered this type of violent repercussion.

But he was clean as a whistle.

We made the notification at his parents' house, as well as his wife's parents.

Both were elderly couples, straight-laced and law-abiding citizens who were now utterly devastated by their overwhelming loss.

I couldn't even begin to imagine.

Mrs. Cincinelli had been an only child, but her husband had two sisters. One was married and lived in SoHo and the other was single, living in the Flatiron District.

"_Let's go talk to the sisters,"_ I suggested. _"The parents don't know anything, but the siblings might."_

The married sister, Alana Fleming, was a harried housewife with three kids all under the age of four. She was clearly distraught over the news about her brother's family, but she put on a brave face for her little ones until she managed to corral them all to the living room where she put on a video to entertain them. Then she led us back into the foyer.

"_Have you talked to Christina?"_ she asked as the tears rolled down her cheeks.

"_No, ma'am_," I told her. "_We're going to see her next. Do you know if your brother was in any kind of trouble?"_

"_Not that I know of, no. But Christina…"_

"_You think she might know something?"_

"_I don't know. She's been off lately, and when I asked her about it, she clammed up. And I haven't been able to reach her since Saturday night."_

Lupo and I shared a look, and then asked her a few more questions before letting Alana get back to her children.

"_So maybe this happened because of Christina?"_ Lupo posed as we went back to the car.

"_Maybe, but it worries me that she's been out of contact for two days."_

"_Uh huh,"_ he agreed cautiously.

We were even more worried when after a trip to Christina's place of employment, a boutique in Chelsea, we learned that Christina had quit her job.

"_She left it on the machine,"_ the manager complained. "_How unprofessional."_

"_Do you know when she called?"_

"_Saturday night. As if that would help me find a replacement by Monday morning. She knows I don't check it until I arrive."_

So then we went to her walk-up on West 21st.

By that point, I'd been expecting to find a body.

But we didn't.

We didn't find anything.

We got the super to let us in, and we searched the place. The strange thing was that it didn't appear as though we were the first ones to snoop around.

Things were in disarray.

Not terribly, but enough.

That was how we ended up back at 1PP at three o'clock in the afternoon, exhausted and confused.

The Gorens were out somewhere, but the Logans had their heads together at Carolyn's desk.

Mike looked up as we walked through the squad room.

"You two look like shit," he said.

"Yeah, well we were out all night. What's your excuse?" I retorted.

"Don't be cranky just because you're not working with your girlfriend anymore."

I swear the man would seriously piss me off if I didn't find him so amusing.

"Easy for you to say when you do all your work six inches away from your wife."

Lupo barked out a laugh, and then I started laughing, too, knowing the dirty joke that must have popped into his mind, but Mike just stared at me.

"Oh, come on, Bernard. He could work at least..._nine_ inches away and we'd still be okay," Carolyn joked, causing us to laugh harder.

Mike looked at her for a minute and then he finally got it.

He grinned and nodded and said, "Maybe even ten."

"Let's not get carried away," I told him as I sat heavily in my chair. "So how's your case coming?"

"We're getting our ducks in a row," he answered. "John's guy came through, so we're sorting through the myriad of crimes that Jack committed to amass his fortune. The feds are gonna love this."

"We're meeting with him tomorrow night," Carolyn added. "I'll move the money into his account, and then the feds will take custody."

"Now, that doesn't sound like much fun," I said sympathetically.

My phone buzzed and I glanced down to read the incoming text from Lauren.

_**Paperwork hell. Is it wrong to wish for someone to get killed? How are you holding up?**_

"It won't be, but like Alex said, I can always hope he'll try to run. What'd you guys get?"

"Family of six killed execution-style," Lupo answered while I typed my reply to Lauren.

_**Sleep would be nice, but right now it's just a fantasy. And be careful what you wish for…I've got six vics and no suspect.**_

"Tell me the house wasn't robbed," Mike said quietly.

"Mike…"

"I'm just asking."

_**You're right. Sorry. Are you going to get off at a decent time?**_

"It wasn't robbed," I confirmed after reading Lauren's text. "And you know as well as I do that your girl is still behind bars."

"Yeah, but we don't know how many boys she has out there to do her bidding."

"This scene was neat and organized. It was done by professionals," Lupo said.

_**I have no idea, but at the very least, I'm going to have to take a dinner break. I'll call you, **_I replied via text.

Mike nodded thoughtfully and asked, "Any suspects?"

"We're still weeding through the preliminaries. And right now, we've got a missing sister, so we may have another victim."

"Unless the sister's your killer."

"I don't see her taking out the nieces and nephews. If it was just the brother, maybe."

"Well, good luck with that."

"They've got a point," Lupo said quietly. "She quit her job, she cleared out her apartment…maybe she's on the run."

"Who's got the Cincinelli murders?"

I looked up to see Mary standing at the edge of the squad room.

"That's us," I answered.

She tilted her head towards the nearest conference room and motioned for us to join her.

"What the…" I mumbled as we crossed the room.

"I don't like where this is going," Lupo said.

We went in the room and Mary closed the door behind us.

"I need to know what you know."

"About our victims?"

"Everything."

"Because…"

"You know why," she said pointedly.

"Shit. Christina?"

"Uh huh. She's in Witsec, so it looks like _your_ case just turned into _our_ case"

**TBC...**


	70. Chapter 70

**Jeremy POV**

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><p>I'd barely been able to sleep at all on Sunday night because of my nerves, and then when I found out that my little mission was going to be postponed another day, I felt like I was ready to crawl out of my skin.<p>

I wanted this to be over with.

And honestly, I was slightly worried about what Cierra might try to do next.

And then that made me feel like a wimp because what kind of guy was afraid of a girl?

Okay, so I could see how I might be afraid of Alex.

She was bad _ass_.

And Liz was a little intimidating, too, but with her it was mostly just because I wanted her to like me so I worked hard to stay in line.

But why the hell was I afraid of Cierra?

I'd asked Dr. Skoda that exact question earlier today.

"_Because she's been manipulating you. It's fear of the unknown, and Cierra has shown that she doesn't fight fair. She likes to take on her opponents after they're drugged and defenseless."_

"_So you don't think it's stupid to be scared?"_

"_I think you'd be stupid not to be."_

But his answers were presumably designed to make me feel better and I wasn't sure if he was being completely truthful.

Would Bobby be afraid of her?

Or my dad?

I wasn't sure.

I'd spent the day studying, but I had a hard time maintaining my focus.

What was Cierra doing at her house all day?

Was she plotting her next move?

Or was she just sitting around, studying, like I was doing?

I couldn't picture her.

I couldn't fathom what was going on in her mind.

"What are you doing?"

I looked up from my seat at the kitchen table to find that Liz had slipped quietly into the room.

It was nearly one o'clock in the morning, and again I couldn't sleep, so I'd come down to get a snack.

"Eating," I replied. "It's what I do best."

"I mean, why aren't you sleeping?"

"Why aren't you?"

"You've been hanging around that shrink too much," she teased as she ran her hand over the top of my head, ruffling my hair. I need a haircut because the curls were starting to crop up everywhere, but it was fairly low on my list of priorities. "Answering questions with questions."

"Is that what you think I'm doing?" I asked with a smirk.

"Ha ha, funny man," she replied, flashing me a grin. She pulled a fork from the drawer and sat down across from me and stole a bite of the pie I was working on. "So what's keeping you up? Cierra or finals?"

"A little bit of both," I admitted. "But mostly Cierra. I told Bobby and Alex that I'd be able to find that data stick. What if I can't? Or what if I do, but there's nothing on it? Or what if…"

"Whatever happens, happens. If you don't give them anything new to work with, they're still no worse off than they were before you went in. And believe me, after today, they may not need the data stick anyway."

"What do you mean?"

She paused, watching me carefully for a minute, and then she took another bite from my plate.

"They got a new case today."

"Okay."

"The victim is the lover of Cierra's stepmother."

"So you think…they think…did she kill him?"

"They don't know yet. But it's a distinct possibility."

"But they had a cop watching her house."

"Yeah, but she's been pretty sneaky so far. Will it surprise you if we learn that she managed to slip out undetected?"

"Well, no," I admitted. "Wow. So if they can tie her to that, then they can arrest her here, where they have jurisdiction."

"That's right."

"And then what? They can search her house?"

"Definitely. If she did this latest murder, then it's just a matter of time."

"So they went and talked to her today?"

"Not yet. They don't want her to know that they've made the connection yet. They're still waiting on more extensive lab work, and a few reports from Baltimore. Once they confirm their suspicions, they can pick her up."

"Man…she killed her stepmom's lover…"

"The fact that her stepmother was cheating on her father may be what started the ball rolling on everything. She probably felt betrayed and…."

"Don't make excuses for her," I interrupted quickly.

"I'm not. I guess I'm just trying to understand her."

"She's psycho. And whatever set her off, she still killed Kelly. And probably Kenny. And now maybe this other guy. That kind of makes her a serial killer, doesn't it?"

"Yeah," she admitted with a nod. "And believe me…I'm not about to offer her forgiveness, so don't think that for one second."

I held her gaze for a long minute and then looked down at my now-empty plate.

"More?" she offered as she got up from the table.

"If you're going to help me eat it, then yeah."

I watched her thoughtfully while she went to cut another slice of pie.

Living with her and my dad had made me see both of them in a different light. In a good way, I mean.

And it also made me more curious about Liz as a person. Kids don't always think of their parents as _people_, but since I was doing that a lot lately, I guess that solidified my feelings that I was tipping more towards being an adult than a kid.

And as I studied her, a new thought crossed my mind. I wanted to ask her about it, but for some reason I held back. Maybe because I didn't know whether or not the subject would make her sad, and I definitely didn't want to upset her.

"What?" she asked me as she sat back down across from me and put the plate between us.

"Nothing," I said dismissively as I dug heartily into the fresh piece.

"I think we're long past the point of censorship and secrets."

"It's not that. I'm not keeping anything from you."

"Then what is it?" she questioned. "You know you can always ask me anything."

"How come you never had kids?"

She was so surprised by my question that she nearly choked on her bite.

"I'm sorry. I guess it's none of my business."

"My life is your business," she corrected. She was quiet for a minute and then she said, "You know, honestly, it's not something I ever seriously considered. The timing was off, I guess. And my career keeps me busy. It would be pretty tough to get called out at two in the morning if I had a toddler in the house."

"Yeah, I guess so."

"And it worked out fine because now I've got two great boys and I didn't have to endure the terrible twos."

"No, just the terrible teens," I said with a grin. "And just wait until Aaron gets down here."

"You're pretty excited about that, aren't you?"

"I want to get him away from Mom. I mean, maybe that's why I was so susceptible to Cierra's brainwashing. I was living with that type of thing for years."

"Your mother's not all bad. Just like I'm not all good," she replied. When I raised my eyebrow at her dubiously, she added, "Ask your dad. I'm sure he's got plenty of stories to tell."

Shortly afterwards, after we polished off the second slice of pie, she left me alone in the kitchen with my thoughts.

"Don't stay up too late," she told me as she headed out. "Big day tomorrow."

So I didn't.

I rinsed off my plate and put it in the sink and then headed upstairs.

I got into bed and wondered if I'd ever be able to fall asleep, but I did because what felt like only a moment later, the alarm went off.

It was show time.

I showered and dressed quickly and then went down for breakfast. Dad was standing at the counter, sipping on a cup of coffee.

"You look well rested," he commented.

"Yeah," I agreed. "I actually slept. Well, I mean, after about two or so. Where's Liz?"

"She got a call around four. Such is the life of an ME."

"I got a text from Bobby a little while ago. Cierra left her house, and the unit followed her until she hit 95-south, so we're on for today. They should be here any minute."

"Okay," he said carefully. "I don't have to tell you to watch yourself around her."

"No."

"And don't push your luck. Get what you can, but don't put yourself at risk."

"I know."

"And listen to the Gorens."

"Dad, I'm not a kid. If you remind me to say please and thank you…"

"I won't," he said, and then he chuckled as he looked down at his coffee. "I know you're not a kid."

I can't explain how it made me feel to hear him say those words.

Silly, maybe, but I couldn't help it.

And I couldn't help giving him a hug, either.

"I'll be careful," I promised him.

Before he could say anything, the doorbell rang and I hustled into the foyer to open the door.

"Time to go," Bobby said, and he seemed wound up tight. He was shifting his weight from one foot to the other and his hands were in constant motion even though they weren't doing anything specific.

Touching the post, adjusting his cuffs, buttoning and unbuttoning his suit jacket…he was literally vibrating.

_This was what it was like in the homestretch of solving a case._

I wanted that feeling.

And I wanted that gold badge he had clipped on the edge of his suit jacket, too.

I said goodbye to my father and followed Bobby to the SUV where Alex was waiting in the driver's seat.

"Keep me in the loop," my dad called out to his detectives.

I could only imagine that was something they heard from him on a regular basis, but they both respectfully agreed and then we were on our way.

I thought it would be weird, riding in a car with them for four hours, but it wasn't.

They talked some about their current case.

"Liz said you think maybe Cierra did it," I commented.

"It's a possibility."

"When will you know?"

"Soon, we hope. We're waiting on lab work."

"Yeah, reports from Baltimore," I said with a nod. "Is that because this guy died the same way as Kenny?"

"It looks like it. But right now, we can't put Cierra at either crime scene, so knowing it and proving it are two different things."

"Maybe she's got something on the data stick."

"Maybe. But if you can't find it…"

"I know. My dad already read me the riot act."

"Just go in and chat with her," Alex said easily. "We're going to get another student to walk by and knock on the door. It'll buy you a few seconds of time to snag anything in plain sight."

"It's a pen data stick. It'll be in her pencil cup," I told them. "I've seen it there a bunch of times."

"But if she had it with her over the weekend, then it might not be there."

"Yeah, I know. But it'll be close. I'll find it."

By the time we got to Baltimore, I felt like Bobby had looked when he'd arrived at the house.

Completely wired.

I could tell that they were getting nervous, too, because they went over the instructions with me several more times as we approached the dorm.

I finally had to cut them loose.

"Twenty minutes," Alex reminded me as I walked away. "If you're gone longer than that, we're coming in with the RA."

I wasn't going to let it take anywhere close to twenty minutes, because the thought of being alone with Cierra…let's just say that yesterday's fear was back.

I went upstairs and down the hall and knocked on her door.

"What?" she said in annoyance as she flung the door open, and then her whole face transformed. "Jeremy! I didn't know you were back on campus!"

She pulled me into a hug that felt more like a vice grip and then backed off and looked at me expectantly.

"Yeah, I just got in this morning. My first final is Friday, so I thought I'd better get used to the routine again. Um…can I come in? I thought maybe we could talk."

She stood back and motioned for me to enter, and then she closed the door firmly behind us.

"You want to talk to me?" she asked, and I suddenly felt like a mouse in a snake cage as she approached me stealthily.

"Yeah, I…I remember. You know, Friday night. When we went to your house."

"I don't know what you mean."

"Yeah, you do. And I think…maybe you might be right."

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah, I think we might be good for each other. You know, we both miss Kelly and maybe we can help each other through the hard times."

I could barely get the sentence out before she pounced on me, kissing me with unchecked fervor. I hadn't expected her to buy into my act so easily and I stumbled backwards from her enthusiasm until I fell back onto the bed.

She went down with me, seemingly excited by our new position, and I struggled to get her to slow down.

"Wait, I just…I meant talk," I argued.

"Beds aren't for talking," she insisted, reaching between us to run her hand over my zipper.

I couldn't do it anymore.

"Shit, Cierra, stop!" I yelled as I shoved her off of me. "I didn't come her to get molested!"

"Then why'd you come here, huh? Did you think you were going to search my room since the cops don't have enough evidence to get a warrant?"

"What? No!"

"Uh huh. So why the one-eighty?"

"I thought we could _talk_," I said again as I got up from the bed and wiped my mouth with the back of my hand. "But you know what? Just forget it."

There was a knock on the door and she kept her eye on me as she walked backwards to the door.

"Then get out," she told me, still watching me.

I knew if I could look at her desk, I'd see the damn data stick, but she wouldn't look away.

The person outside knocked again, harder this time, and she finally turned to open the door.

I whipped around and looked greedily over the array of items spread across her desk, and then I saw it.

The data stick made to look like an ink pen.

It was lying there next to her keys, so I knew she must have had it with her in New York.

I moved in front of it so that my body would block my action from her view and then I reached for it, but just as my fingers touched the plastic, a pain exploded inside of my head and the lights went out.

**TBC...**


	71. Chapter 71

**Alex POV**

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><p>"We should've wired him."<p>

"Then he wouldn't exactly be going in on his own accord, would he?"

"Still," I said as I looked at my watch yet again.

It had only been six minutes since Jeremy went up to Cierra's dorm room.

Nearly a third of the predetermined acceptable amount of time.

But I couldn't shake the bad feeling about this whole thing.

Because Cierra was a man-eater.

She might believe that he was willing to forgive and forget, but then that would give him a whole different set of problems.

And maybe he was more experienced with women than I was giving him credit for, but it still worried me.

"Let's go in and grab the RA," Bobby said.

"It hasn't been twenty minutes."

"I know, but I think it's been long enough."

We went up the steps, but just as we opened the door, my cell buzzed with an incoming text.

"It's Liz," I told him. "She says they pulled two prints off the condom packet. One belongs to the vic and the other is unidentified."

Yesterday, Liz had determined that Stanley had sex before he was killed, and there was evidence of spermicide, indicating the use of a condom. Of course, that didn't mean he'd had sex _right_ before he was killed, but then CSU found a condom wrapper in a nearby trashcan.

Durex.

"The stepmother's prints are in the system," Bobby reminded me, referencing the fact that Tammy Bingham had been popped back in 1993 for a DUI. "And we know how Cierra loves Durex."

"So she really slept with her stepmother's lover before she killed him?"

"Nothing that girl does surprises me."

And he had a point about that.

But even though Liz had found an unidentified print, we still couldn't tie it to Cierra.

I mean, not without taking her in and getting her prints, because so far, she wasn't in the system.

"But if we can get her on the kidnapping," Bobby continued. "Then we can print her, and match her with the condom."

"Which puts her at the scene with Stanley," I said, slowly nodding my head.

"Who was killed using the precise blend of ketamine and propofol that caused the death of Kenny Cossman."

Because yeah, we had that, too.

Liz had been working tirelessly on this one, and she had a rapport with the Baltimore ME, so while we were en route to Baltimore this morning, she'd been helping us solve our case.

"And Kenny had the suicide note which claimed responsibility for Kelly, but if we can prove he was murdered, then that should tie _his_ killer into the death of Kelly. It's a goddamn house of cards, but we how are we going to get it to fall?" I asked in frustration.

"I'm not ready to quit on it," he said. "Are you?"

"Not in this lifetime."

We went up the stairs in the dormitory and then down the hall to the RA's room, which was two doors down from Cierra's room. I could see that her door was closed, which was expected, but it still didn't make me feel any better.

I wanted to get Jeremy out of there.

Using him as bait to catch a sociopath wasn't giving me a warm, fuzzy feeling.

I banged on the RA's door just as my phone started to ring.

"Goren," I answered, since the number was a line at1PP.

"I found your girl on the tapes," the detective told me.

Southside had sent over the last of their security footage this morning. We'd hoped to have it all yesterday, but it was tough to complain about the delay, considering they were being cooperative without the issuance of a warrant.

But since we had to make the road trip this morning, we'd farmed out the task of analyzing the footage.

"Just our girl, or both of them?" I clarified.

"Both of them. If you need evidence that she was with him that night, you've got it, cut and dried."

I hung up and found Bobby watching me, even though the RA had opened his door and was waiting expectantly.

I held Bobby's gaze while telling the RA, "Get your keys and open up Cierra Bingham's door. We're placing her under arrest for kidnapping."

A minute later, we stood outside Cierra's door while the RA slipped the key into the lock.

As soon as he got the knob to turn, Bobby shoved him out of the way, and the two of us burst into the dorm room.

"Oh, thank God you're here!" Cierra cried out. "I was getting ready to call 9-1-1!"

Jeremy was face first on the floor and he was bleeding from the back of his head. Cierra had been on her knees next to him, but upon our entrance, she'd hopped to her feet.

"What the hell happened?" I asked as I rushed over next to Jeremy.

"He hit his head, and now I can't wake him up!"

"Hit it on what? The tennis racket that you were swinging at him?" I fired back.

The racket was on the floor under the bed, and even though I was three feet away, I could see the slight dent and the reddish discoloration.

"Holy shit!" the RA said, having peeked through the doorway to see what was going on.

"Get out!" I yelled. "And call 9-1-1!"

Bobby took control of Cierra, turning her around and pushing her face-first into the wardrobe.

"Cierra Bingham, you're under arrest for kidnapping," he stated as he slapped on the cuffs. She immediately started crying, and begging with him to let her go, but he ignored her and went through her Miranda rights.

While he did that, I turned Jeremy onto his back and was relieved to see that he was starting to come around.

"I didn't hit him!" Cierra shouted again. "He fell!"

I ignored her, and so did Bobby as he held her in place against the wardrobe with a hand in the middle of her back.

"Can you hear me?" I said to Jeremy as I leaned over him and gently shook him.

He managed to open his eyes and focus on me for a moment, and then he said, "It's on the desk."

"What is?"

"Her data stick."

"That's why I hit him!" Cierra called out. "He was trying to steal from me! I was just protecting my property! It was self-defense."

"Honestly, right now we don't really care about that," Bobby told her. "That's Baltimore's problem. You're going with us, back to New York."

"Although, maybe we need to confiscate the item in question," I added. "I mean, if this incident revolves around the data stick, then I'd say it's evidence."

The RA came back into the room looking frazzled, but he had his phone in his hand, so that was a good sign.

Although as it turned out, he'd called campus security in addition to 9-1-1, so within ten minutes of us putting Cierra in handcuffs, the room was swarmed by paramedics, BPD, and JHU security.

The military has a term for a situation like this.

Carolyn uses it from time to time, and for some reason it was stuck in my head.

Cluster fuck.

Maybe it was because there was no better phrase to perfectly describe our current situation.

Everyone was talking at once, and insisting on the showing of ID's, and the rehashing of facts, and a call was placed to Ross to confirm that we had authorization to arrest Cierra, and we received an admonishment from BPD for not giving them a heads-up, and one from campus security as well.

While this was happening, the EMT checked out Jeremy's pupils and his cognitive ability and then tended to the wound on the back of his head and set him loose.

Cierra, on the other hand, spent much of the time whining about our abusive treatment of her, complaining to the campus security officer that Bobby and I had targeted her and she was merely the victim of malicious prosecution.

The security officer, who by the way was about twenty-five and nice-looking and was completely under Cierra's spell, then tried to argue with the BPD about whether or not we could legally take Cierra back to our jurisdiction.

Ultimately, a conference call was placed between Cutter, Ross, and the BPD captain. Ten minutes later, Bobby and I were given the go-ahead, but by this time Jeremy wasn't the only one with a headache.

"Search the room," I instructed the smitten security officer. I turned to the RA and added, "And you watch him. She's got drugs in here somewhere, and whatever you find needs to be handed over to the BPD and fully documented."

I pointed out the pen-looking data stick to the BPD officer and suggested that he take the evidence into custody, since Cierra's claim was that Jeremy was attempting to steal it.

"I'll retract the charges!" she called out insistently.

"You'd rather be arrested for assault?" Bobby asked her.

"It'll never stick."

"The bloody gauze on the back of his head, and the skull-shaped dent in your tennis racket say otherwise," I retorted. The cop bagged the stick and I added, "Make sure you get that to Detective Rainey. And tell him that after he gets a chance to look at it…"

"I'll have him call you if anything on here implicates her in another crime," he said with a nod.

So then _finally_, more than two hours after arriving in Baltimore, we left the dorm and headed back to the SUV.

I wasn't crazy about spending the next four hours in the car with Cierra, and I sure as hell wasn't going to make Jeremy sit in the backseat with her, but I also I wasn't putting Bobby back there either, so I tossed him the keys and climbed in next to our modern-day Lolita.

I hate being a passenger, especially in the backseat, but under the circumstances, this was the best way.

"You don't know who you're messing with," she said to me before we were even out of the parking lot.

"You know you have the right to remain silent, right?" I asked her with unmasked annoyance.

"Let me tell you what happened," she said, dropping her voice to a low whisper so that I was the only one who could hear.

"Back there in your dorm room?"

She nodded solemnly at me, and then I watched in amazement as her eyes suddenly filled with tears.

"I mean, I admit that some of it's my fault," she said. "I flirted with him. But then…he…he came after me."

"He attacked you," I stated in disbelief.

"Yeah, he threw me on the bed and then he was all over me, and I couldn't make him stop. He kept kissing me and putting his hands…everywhere, and I kept begging him to stop, but he wouldn't."

I raised an eyebrow at her as I continued to stare at her dubiously.

"And so then…you picked up your tennis racket and bashed him in the _back_ of the head?"

"The racket was on my bed, and I reached for it, but I could just barely feel it with my fingertips, and then as soon as I got a good enough grip, I swung upwards and caught him in the back of the head."

"And then what? He fell, not only off the bed, but three feet _away_ from the bed? Cierra, I'm disappointed. I thought you'd have something better."

She instantly stopped crying and her whole countenance changed.

"Yeah, I need to work on that, don't I? Don't worry. Just wait until a jury gets a load of me. There's no way in hell they'll convict me of jaywalking, much less this ridiculous assault charge."

"We're not charging you with assault," I reminded her.

"Oh yeah, that's right. What is it, kidnapping? Because I had a date with him and he didn't want to tell his parents, so they said I abducted him? Whatever. Good luck getting that one to stick, too."

The drive home wasn't the longest four hours of my life.

It was the longest _six_ hours of my life, thanks to the two tractor trailers who collided on I-95, creating a traffic-stopping mess of chickens and ice cream.

And throughout the entire six hours, Cierra talked.

About herself, and her great beauty and sexual prowess.

About me, and my lack of both.

I wanted to ask her about Stanley, but I didn't let myself get baited into any kind of conversation.

I just needed to wait until we could process her so that we could match her prints to the condom used by Stanley just prior to his death.

Then we could start the real interrogation.

The one about the murders.

And hopefully, when all was said and done, we'd let New York throw everything it could at her.

And after that, we'd send her down to Baltimore to let them finish her off.

TBC...


	72. Chapter 72

**Connie POV**

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><p>By Tuesday evening, everything was starting to feel normal again.<p>

I had a stack of briefs needing my attention, I had dozens of emails that needed replies, and I'd just worked through dinner.

So yeah, things were pretty normal.

I was currently working in Mike's office because he'd already left for the day and he said he'd feel better if I was working behind closed doors.

"_My stalker's dead, remember?"_ I'd remarked, looking up at him as he stood in his office doorway.

"_Humor me, Connie,"_ he'd said with a smile as he adjusted his tie.

That was when it hit me that it was only five-thirty and he was leaving the office.

"_Where are you going?"_ I'd asked suspiciously as I got up from my desk and headed for his office.

I didn't mind working in there, and I thought it was sweet that he was still looking out for me.

He looked slightly embarrassed, and he didn't answer for a moment. Instead, he went back into his office and grabbed his jacket from the back of the chair. By that point, I'd entered his office, and so I stood and watched him expectantly until he finally cracked.

"_I have a date," _he admitted, somewhat reluctantly.

"_You do?"_

"_Don't sound so surprised," _he answered.

"_I'm not surprised, I'm just…okay, I'm surprised. Not that I didn't think you could get a date, but…"_

"_Just…quit while you're behind, okay?"_ he said on a laugh. "_I might not be _your_ type, but some women find me attractive."_

The comment probably would've made me uncomfortable not too long ago, but we were past that now.

"_Who is it? Do I know her?"_

He furrowed his brow and looked at me skeptically and said, "_How long was it before you told me about you and Lupo?"_

"_Oh, that's different."_

"_I don't see how. You kept your love life out of the office. For a while, anyway. I'm going to keep mine out of it, too."_

"_Okay_," I agreed, unable to stop the smile. He was actually pretty cute, especially since he was so flustered.

He finished adjusting his jacket and tie and then looked down at himself with uncharacteristic nervousness.

"_You look very handsome,"_ I assured him.

He tilted his head, looking at me curiously.

"_I never said that I don't find you attractive," _I said in answer to his questioning look.

"_I'm just not Lupo,"_ he conceded, although he didn't seem upset by that fact.

"_And I'm not…wait, I'm sorry – what's her name again?"_

He chuckled and waggled his finger at me.

"_Uh uh. This is only our third date. If it gets to more than that, I might introduce you."_

He headed for the door, and I went around to sit down at his desk, but then he paused in the doorway.

"_Actually, you know…Mary invited me to that housewarming party on Friday night. Do you think she'd mind…"_

"_If you bring a date? I think that's a great idea,"_ I replied.

I was glad to hear that he was planning on coming to the party at all, and even happier that he was thinking about bringing a date. He spent entirely too much time in the office, and getting out and having a social life would be good for him.

"_Okay, well…we'll see how tonight goes_," he said vaguely. _"Don't stay too late, okay?"_

"_Just an hour or two,"_ I promised.

My estimate turned out to be fairly accurate.

I got a text from Lupo about ten minutes ago.

_**Will you be done any time soon? I can be out of here in twenty minutes.**_

I hadn't seen much of him lately because of the new case he and Bernard had picked up on Sunday night.

I responded quickly and definitively.

_**I'll work until you get here and we can go home together.**_

I probably had another twenty minutes before he showed up, considering the time it would take him to drive over here, so I scanned through my emails to rate their importance.

The one that caught my eye was from Harris Schmenke.

I clicked on the email and glanced over the brief message.

_My client is interested in making a deal, but there are conditions. Call me at your earliest convenience so that we can discuss this matter._

Conditions?

Was he serious?

I glanced at the clock as I reached for the phone, hoping to nip this thing in the bud right now. It was almost seven o'clock, which meant that he probably wouldn't answer, but it was worth a shot.

Voice mail.

"Mr. Schmenke, this is Connie Rubirosa with the Manhattan District Attorney's office," I said in a firm, professional tone. "I can't imagine why I'd agree to any condition that your incarcerated client wants to impose. The offer is ten years, to be served upon his release from Frackville. Discuss it with your client, and call me back. The offer's good for twenty-four hours."

I slammed the phone back down on its cradle, having worked myself up into an indignant outrage on Lauren's behalf.

"You sweet-talk everybody like that?"

I looked up and saw Lupo lingering in the doorway, and my stomach executed a series of somersaults.

He looked rumpled and exhausted, but he was smiling at me and I suddenly felt like I couldn't breathe just from wanting him.

_Four more months and he'll be mine forever_, I thought.

But then it hit me that he already was. Maybe I was getting a little too hung up on the whole idea of making it official.

"Come here," I told him, crooking my finger at him as I pushed the chair back from the desk.

He started walking towards me, but then I said, "Close the door."

He paused and looked at me with a mixed expression of curiosity and interest and then he turned around and shut the door.

"Where's Cutter?" he asked as he crossed the room and came around the desk.

"Out. He's on a date."

"Really?"

"Uh huh," I said, reaching up to grab his tie so that I could pull him closer to me.

He leaned down, putting one hand on each of the chair's arms, and then he hesitated expectantly, his lips mere inches from mine.

"I've missed you," I said softly, slipping one hand around to the back of his head and closing the final distance between us.

Now, making out in my boss' office is not something I ever thought I'd do.

And maybe it was only because I hadn't considered making out with the _boss_, I don't know.

But now that I was doing it with my soon-to-be husband, there was no denying that there was an increased level of excitement and arousal brought about from being in such a forbidden location.

I'd never be able to look at Mike, sitting behind this desk, the same again.

I was fighting with myself to show some modicum of restraint so as not to get too carried away when the phone rang, making the decision for me.

"I need to get that," I mumbled as I reluctantly pulled away.

Damn, the man could get me so worked up in such a short period of time. And it's not like I actually planned to make love on Mike's desk or anything, but still…

Lupo sat down on the edge of the desk and flashed me a devastating smile that made me pause with my hand hovering over the phone, and then I forced myself to grab it.

"Rubirosa," I answered with false amenability.

"Harris Schmenke here. I got your message. I don't think you should be so quick to dismiss my client's request. You haven't even heard what he wants."

"He's already serving time for rape and murder," I fired back stiffly, my lusty haze from moments ago having quickly dissipated. "And I'm offering him a deal on a _second_ rape…"

"To avoid making the victim go to trial," he interrupted.

"Bypassing the trial works to everyone's benefit," I said sharply. "Believe me...if I put the victim on the stand, your client will do more than the ten I'm offering."

"We're interested in the plea bargain," he stated. "But like I said, based on one condition. My client wants to meet with the victim."

"What? No. No way."

"If there's a trial, she'll be there."

"Yeah, so?"

"So, he wants to see her. He wants to express his remorse."

"Tell him to write a letter. Draw a picture. Whatever. There's no need for a personal visit."

And the idea that he wanted a visit was slightly nauseating.

I didn't believe that it was so that he could ask for forgiveness. It was most likely because he wanted to see her again so he that he could better relive the incident in his mind.

"You're not even going to discuss it with her?" Schmenke asked me. "You'll be doing her a disservice if you don't present her with every option."

"So that's it? He meets with her and takes the deal, or she refuses and it goes to trial?"

"That's right," he said arrogantly.

I wanted to reach through the phone and strangle him.

"Big mistake," I said hotly. "I'll bury you at trial, and your client will be lucky if he ever lives to see the light of day as a free man."

I slammed down the phone and sat back in the chair.

"I hate lawyers," I complained. "They're slimy and condescending and immoral…"

"Not all lawyers," he countered.

I let out a heavy sigh and finally met his gaze.

"Do you want to talk about it?" he asked me.

"No. I want to go home and finish what we started," I said as I reached over and powered down the computer.

"Are you sure?"

"No," I said again, and then I let out a grunt of frustration. "Damn it, Lupo, why does this guy have to be such a prick?"

I grabbed my cell phone from the desk and then looked at Lupo apologetically.

"I need to make a call."

"Lauren?"

"Yeah."

I'd told Lupo about what was going on with her. With her permission, of course.

"_You can tell him,"_ she'd said.

We'd spent a couple of hours together on Sunday afternoon, and while I was glad that she'd invited me, her story was the last thing in the world I'd expected to hear.

"_Why would I do that?"_

"_Because. He's your… well, he's _almost_ your husband. I don't want you to have secrets from him."_

"_Sometimes in our line of work, we have to keep secrets,_" I reminded her.

"_It's okay_," she insisted. _"I'm going with the theory that it's nothing I should be ashamed about."_

"_Of course it's not,_" I'd said quickly.

"_I'm just saying…it's been ten years. And the guy's been caught. And I need to stop treating it like it's some deep, dark forbidden topic that should only be discussed in code between the couple of people who're in the know. It happened. End of story_."

I'd stared at her for a moment, marveling at the amount of inner strength she possessed, and then she'd looked at me self-consciously.

"_What?"_

"_I've met a lot of rape victims. You've got to be the strongest yet."_

"_I doubt that_," she deflected. _"Besides, it took ten years and Bernard's support for me to get to this point."_

"_Whatever it took…you're here."_

And I'd been thrilled to hear that Bernard was standing by her. Not that I thought he wouldn't, but sometimes guys have trouble with that kind of thing.

"I need to make a quick call, too," Lupo said as he got up from the desk. "I'll wait outside while you finish up and then we'll go home, okay?"

He smirked at me as he rebuttoned the top two buttons on his shirt, the ones I'd undone in our quick and dirty make-out session, and then he tightened his tie back into place and headed for the door.

"You're just making more work for me," I teased him as I dialed Lauren's number. "I'm going to have to undo that tie again, and the buttons…"

"I'm counting on it," he called over his shoulder and then he slipped out of the room and closed the door behind him.

"Hayes," Lauren answered, sounding completely out of breath.

"Lauren? Am I catching you at a bad time?"

"No, it's…I'm…hang on."

I couldn't help but smile at her inability to put a sentence together, and then I felt bad that I was about to ruin her night.

"Okay. Sorry," she said when she came back on the line.

"I can call you later," I offered.

"It's not…I was running," she explained. "And when I pulled out my phone, my keys came out of my pocket, too, and I dropped them."

"You're running? That sounds awfully ambitious."

"I used to do it all the time, but I've been slacking lately. I'm trying to get back into it."

"Good for you. I'm not sure I'd be dedicated enough. What do you do when it's raining?"

"I get wet," she said on a laugh. "So what's up?"

"I spoke with Schmenke tonight."

"That's the lawyer, right?"

"Uh huh."

"Let me guess. No deal."

"No, he's willing to deal. But he's got strings. He wants to meet you."

"Schmenke?"

"No, Flowers."

That was the rapist's name.

Bill Flowers.

How could such a sick, twisted guy have such a normal name?

I don't know, but I hated even saying it out loud.

"I was planning to go anyway," she said, surprising me once again with her grit. "Bernard and I talked about going this weekend."

"Oh. So…"

"Wait, so he said what…no deal if I don't go?"

"Right. Either you come for a visit or it goes to trial."

"You offered him ten years?"

"Yeah."

"You know what? Fuck him," she said firmly.

"So you're not going?"

"Oh, I'm going. But I'm going because _I _want to, not because I'm caving to his request."

"Are you sure?"

"Positive. If he won't make the deal without that condition attached, then take the bastard to trial."

TBC...


	73. Chapter 73

**Logan POV**

* * *

><p>Tuesday evening was a long time coming.<p>

I mean, I wanted this guy back in November.

Of course, at the time I thought I'd gotten him.

I always hate when the DA's make deals after we've worked so hard to catch the bad guys.

McCoy used to always remind me _sometimes you have to worry about the bigger fish_.

Yeah, that was all good and well, but I didn't want to do it at the expense of the smaller fish.

And what the hell kind of analogy was that anyway?

In real life, if you use a little fish to catch a big one, the little one still ends up dead.

In the justice system, the little fish were given their freedom to go about committing more crimes.

So it wasn't exactly the same thing.

But whatever.

This time, Jack was going down.

Carolyn had spoken with the feds earlier today.

"_Trust me. You're going to want this guy,_" she said. And then she told them just enough to pique their interest. "_You guys gave him a sweetheart deal, but he was holding out on you. He's got fourteen mil squirreled away_."

Suffice it to say, they were anxious for this moment, too.

And by _this_ moment, I mean the one where we were all standing around waiting for Carolyn to give the signal.

I couldn't believe that he didn't suspect anything. I made the two feds sitting by the front door in less than five seconds. There was a third agent in the booth next to Carolyn and Jack, and a fourth at the table across from them.

Me, I was hanging out near the back exit.

I'd asked for and had been granted permission to cover that potential escape route.

I was _really_ hoping he'd use it.

I was dressed casual, complete with a Yankees cap on backwards, as I sat with my back to the booth in question. I would've rather been turned the other way, but I couldn't risk Jack recognizing me.

But I was listening.

The feds weren't.

They didn't need to.

When Carolyn gave the signal, they'd arrest Jack and it would only take a quick check of his laptop to access his Caymans account, which would by that point be loaded with the dirty money and a trail that a blind man could follow.

But _I_ was listening because I wanted to stay on top of the situation in case something went wrong.

"_You just want to make sure he doesn't persuade me to join him,_" Carolyn teased earlier when we were getting ready for the meeting.

"_Is that a possibility_?" I asked her as I encroached on her personal space.

And of course, I knew she was kidding. I was way past the point of worrying about something like that.

"_Please_," she said dismissively, letting her eyes travel over me appreciatively as I stood in front of her in nothing but my boxer shorts. "_Besides, he's not going anywhere but federal prison."_

"_Oh, so it's his destination that'll keep you with me."_

"_Well, yeah. I mean, if he was headed for the Maldives, how could I resist_?" she joked challengingly.

I loved that she was in a playful mood, especially after all we'd been through, and I couldn't resist rising to the occasion.

I grabbed her and threw her over my shoulder, ignoring her protests as I carried her from the bathroom into the bedroom where I tossed her onto the bed. I quickly got on top of her, putting a hand on either side of her head, and I did my best to look threatening.

"_You'd pick the Maldives over me?"_

"_I'd never pick anywhere or anyone over you,"_ she said, suddenly serious.

Then she slid her hands around to my backside and pulled me down tightly against her, and that was the end of our playfulness.

It was more a physical competition as we each fought for control.

It wasn't exactly what I'd had in mind when I suggested that we leave 1PP early enough so that we could go home first, but it certainly served to work off our excess nervous energy.

And I'll admit it.

I finished quickly enough that we still had time to take care of _actual_ business.

But it was still damn good, and I was thinking that maybe the quickie was just the prelude for things to come later.

Because now that I'd taken the edge off, and _after_ we put the nail in Jack's coffin, I had a good feeling that I'd be ready for round two.

I arrived at the diner almost a full hour ahead of the designated meeting time, and I was pleased to find that the feds were already there.

Carolyn came in fifteen minutes ahead of schedule and sat down at a specific table, one predetermined by the feds.

"_**I like you in that hat**,"_ she said as a way to check our communication devices.

"_I'll be sure to wear it later,"_ I replied. "_So, you're ready, right?"_

**"_Have you ever known me _not**_** to be ready**?"_ she asked confidently, but I could hear the slight shake in her voice.

She was a little nervous.

There were still some variables and Jack had certainly proven that he had the ability to throw down a wild card.

"_Never,"_ I assured her. "_You've got something for anything he throws at you. And if you don't…"_

"**_Then I've got you_**," she finished.

After that, we fell silent as we waited for Jack to arrive.

He'd shown up ten minutes later, and he must have slid in the booth on the same side with Carolyn because she said, "**_You know, there's another bench on the other side_**."

"**_Are you afraid to be too close to me, darlin'? I don't mind if you can't keep your hands to yourself."_**

"_**That won't be a problem**,_" she said quickly. "**_Okay, let's get this over with."_**

**"_What's the rush? You didn't tell me how you enjoyed your little trip."_**

"_Oh, for Christ's sake_," I muttered.

"**_Grand C**ayman** and back in less than twenty-four hours_**," she said. "**_It was a blast_."**

**"_And you've got everything set up?"_**

**"_I'm just waiting on you."_**

Things were quiet again as Jack presumably powered on his computer. I could hear the tapping of keys, and then Carolyn said, "_**Okay, check it out**."_

So now we were just waiting for the signal.

Or at least, the feds were.

She was supposed to flag down the waitress and ask for a glass of water once Jack had logged onto his account and confirmed the transfer.

I could only pray that Peter was as dependable as John claimed, and that he'd made sure the trail successfully moved along with the money.

"_**I almost hate for this to be over**,"_ Jack said to her. "_**This could be the last time you see me."**_

_**"Promises, promises."**_

_**"Come on, darlin'. You know it wasn't all bad."**_

_**"No, it wasn't. But that was before I knew better."**_

_**"You know, all this shit…the games and set-ups…I didn't do it to hurt you. I would've dropped it all in a second if I thought you'd take me back. You can't honestly believe that Mike's good enough for you. He's damaged goods, darlin'. You have to know that."**_

His comment didn't really surprise me, considering that had been his theme all along, but Carolyn's response to it did.

"_**You should leave now**_," she said quietly, her tone suggesting that maybe she was trying to protect him. "_**Go out the back**_."

She was sending him to me.

She's just the best wife ever.

Because there were four feds in here, so there was no way he was actually going to escape, but still…

She was giving me the opportunity to gloat just a little.

I got up from the table and turned around just as Jack was hustling down the aisle with the laptop tucked under his arm.

I stood up straight with my feet spread and my arms across my chest, effectively blocking his path.

He pulled up short when he saw me, but he managed to put a smile on his face.

"What, are you gonna pop me? For what? Violation of the TRO? Come on, Mike. You're better than that."

"Uh huh," I agreed. "I am. And I'm not going to pop you for anything. I'm gonna let the gentlemen behind you take care of it."

He stared at me for another moment and then looked over his shoulder at the four feds who were loitering behind him.

"You set me up," he said to Carolyn. "You lying little bitch."

"Lying? I'm pretty sure I was upfront from the beginning about the fact that I didn't want to have anything to do with you," she retorted.

"Jack Quarles, you're under arrest," one of the agents said as he grabbed Jack by the arm and confiscated the laptop.

The entire entourage made its way out of the diner while Jack continued to struggle and shout about his innocence.

Carolyn and I followed along, and I have to admit to enjoying the scene immensely.

I'd thought that it would be more fun to beat his ass, but somehow this was almost equally gratifying.

"What are you arresting me for?" he yelled as an agent shoved him into the back of a sedan. "I don't know what this bitch told you, but you don't have shit on me. It's her! It's all her! I've got proof!"

"Thanks for the tip, Barek," another agent said as he came over to shake her hand.

"I appreciate you going along with our set-up," she said to her former colleague.

"Hey, for old times' sake, right? And anytime you want to drop a guy like him in our laps, we're sure as hell not going to argue with your methods."

"Hey, would you give me just a minute with him?" I asked the agent. He looked at his partner, who shrugged his response, and so I climbed into the backseat with Jack.

"Ah…this feels good, doesn't it?" I asked him.

"You're so fucked," he said through gritted teeth.

"You keep saying crap like that, but the funny thing is that I'm not the one handcuffed and on my way to federal prison."

"That's fine. I'm glad they got my laptop. Guess what's on it?"

"I'm going to let you in on a little secret. Carolyn told me about you from the beginning, so I've been involved from day one. And those pictures? I've seen them. No big deal. Seeing them actually made me feel better about myself. Now I never have to worry if she's comparing me to you because even if she is, I'm winning that match-up, Jackie boy. As for my mother, I'm over it and she's dead, so it's a moot point. The thing with Cher…now that was creative. I'll give you that."

"Uh huh, I've got her on that one," he said, somewhat surprised that I seemed to be complimenting him. "Just wait 'til I give her up to the feds. I'll get another deal, and _she'll_ be the one going to jail."

"No, see, she's got an alibi. You know from who? The director of the FBI."

I grinned at him, enjoying the hell out of his dismay.

"Yeah, go figure," I continued with a shrug. "So bring up that case. I dare you. Because when they find out that you saved a _hair_ for fifteen years and then planted it at the murder scene…well, you're going to end up in a strait jacket."

"Big fucking deal," he said bravely. "So they'll get me…for _what_? Planting a little evidence? Some con game? TRO violation?"

"Embezzlement and money laundering," I told him. "You know how you tied every transaction to Carolyn's name? Well now it's tied to yours."

I patted him on the leg and reached for the door handle before turning back to add casually, "Have fun in Leavenworth. I think maybe I'll write my old buddy Dick Slater and let him know that you'll be joining him. I bet he's already made some new friends there, and I'm sure he'd love to hear how you sold him out."

I opened the door, and Jack lunged at me, pushing me out of the car with his body, and the two of us landed on the pavement.

Dumb move on his part, considering he was still handcuffed, so it only took me a second to gain the upper hand.

And yeah, then I hit him.

And it turns out that I was wrong.

Watching him get placed under arrest wasn't _nearly_ as much fun as hitting him.

TBC...


	74. Chapter 74

**Hayes POV**

* * *

><p>I hung up with Connie and shoved my phone back into my pocket before resuming my jog.<p>

My outrage over the call caused me to increase my pace, and before long, I was flat-out running.

But I still didn't stop.

Instead, I ran as fast as I could while I replayed our conversation in my mind.

When did I get so brave?

I didn't want this thing to go to trial.

I didn't want to have to get on the witness stand and discuss in detail exactly what happened.

Not to mention the fact that then my personal life would be put on trial as well.

Every lover, every misstep…

And not only would Connie be there to hear every word, but undoubtedly so would Bernard.

But hadn't I already decided that none of that mattered?

I've made mistakes in my life, but nothing worth being ashamed of.

And I wasn't about to give my rapist power over me _again_.

Flowers didn't deserve to have any kind of control over me, and I damn sure wasn't going to let him dictate the terms of the plea.

I was going to make him either accept or decline the agreement, without the condition attached.

And _after_ the arrangement was finalized, then I'd go visit him in prison.

And I'm not sure why I feel such a strong need to see him, although Bernard agreed with me that it would be a good idea.

"_It'll give you the chance to see that he's just a cowardly little man who hid behind a gun_," he'd said to me last night. "_He's nothing."_

"_And you," _he continued as he pulled me into his arms._ "You're everything."_

And then he'd kissed me so gently, so sweetly, that I almost believed him.

I almost believed that to _him_, I was everything.

It was a strange and lifting feeling to realize that I was so important in someone's life.

I've never felt important to anyone. Not even my parents.

I mean, they love me.

I know that, even though it's only in their own weird way.

But as far as being _vital_ to them…I don't know. Once I went my own way, throwing their dreams for me to the wind, they kind of gave up on me.

But with Bernard, it wasn't about what he wanted for me.

He just wanted what _I _wanted for me.

A honking car horn snapped my focus back to the here and now, and I slowed my ridiculous pace down to a walk as I worked hard to catch my breath.

A quick glance at my surroundings told me that I'd gone much further than my usual route, and I was now quite a ways from home.

Shaking my head at my own idiocy, I bent at the waist and put my hands on my knees as I continued to try to regulate my breathing.

I hadn't run in more than a month, and even then it had only been a few miles.

Tonight, I'd gone at least five, and I still had to get back home.

My cell phone rang again, so I stood up straight and pulled it from my pocket.

"Hayes."

"Do you have any idea what it does to me to hear you so breathless?"

I smiled immediately at the sound of Bernard's voice and I started walking slowly back towards my apartment.

"No idea whatsoever. So why don't you tell me?"

"I'd rather show you. Where are you?"

"I'm heading home now."

"You're still out running?"

"Yeah. I got distracted and went a lot further than I meant to, so it's going to take me another forty-five minutes or so to get back."

"You got distracted while you were running? I don't know how you do that. I'm always painfully aware of every single step."

I laughed and picked up my pace again, now anxious to see him.

He and Lupo had worked late, and then he'd gone home to pick up a few things, so I hadn't seen him since early this morning.

"_Bring a suit,"_ I'd told him when he called this afternoon to let me know his plans. "_Maybe two."_

"_Two suits? Now you're just talking crazy."_

"_Okay, so bring one. I don't mind if you wear it a couple of days in a row."_

"_Are you planning on holding me hostage at your place?"_

"_Absolutely."_

"So where are you, exactly?" I asked him. "Are you at my place?"

"No, but I'm getting close. I should be there in a few minutes. Or…where are _you_ exactly?"

I gave him the cross streets of the intersection I was going through.

"That's only a block or two away from that place…what's it called? Something about a pigeon."

"Yeah, that's right."

"Good. Meet me there, and we'll get something to eat. I'm starving."

"B., I'm wearing shorts and a tank top, and I'm all sweaty."

"That's just the way I like you," he replied, and I could tell he was smiling. Then he said, "But if you'd rather come home first so that you can change…"

"No," I agreed. The place was pretty casual, and what did I care if I got a few stares? "Come on. I'll meet you there."

I hung up with Bernard and turned down the next side street. Halfway down the block was the Three Jolly Pigeons. It tends to get rowdy on Friday nights, but Tuesdays were pretty low-key.

I went in and easily found a vacant high-top table for two. I self-consciously ran my hand over my hair, but I figured there wasn't a lot I could do about it at this point.

The waiter came over and took my drink order, and as soon as he left, a guy who'd been sitting at the bar got up and wandered over to my table.

"Haven't I seen you someplace before?" he asked me as he blatantly looked me over.

"Yeah, that's why I don't go there anymore," I retorted dismissively.

What was it about guys that made them think it was a good idea to hit on a woman who hadn't even spared him a glance?

"You're funny," he said with a smile. "I like that."

It was a shame I didn't have my badge and gun with me. But fortunately, or unfortunately as the case may be, I'm experienced in dealing with losers.

"You know what I like?" I asked him.

"What?"

"You, sitting back at the bar."

"Is this guy bugging you?" the waiter asked as he returned with my drink.

"Yeah, I think he's lost. You might want to help him find his way back under his rock."

The annoying Romeo finally had the good sense to look offended, but the waiter took him by the arm and guided him back towards the bar.

"Bitch," the guy called out as a lame attempt at a parting shot.

The waiter looked back at me apologetically, but I just shrugged it off and picked up my drink.

It wasn't the first time I'd been called that, and it certainly wouldn't be the last. I wasn't going to waste time getting into a pissing match with him.

Instead I put the scene out of my head and wondered how Bobby and Alex were faring tonight. I knew they'd brought in Cierra but I hadn't gotten an update on how the interrogation went.

Or maybe it was still going on. It was hard to say, since she may or may not have asked for a lawyer. But I was pretty sure that either way, by the end of the night, they'd get their confession.

Those two were _that_ good.

Eames had checked in with Alex just before we left the 2-7 because at that point we hadn't heard anything. It was tough not being at 1PP after working there for three weeks.

And it didn't help that we hadn't gotten a case yet.

"_I don't want you two to get a reputation,"_ Loo had said when we met in her office on Monday morning.

"_As the favorites_?" Eames asked her with a smile.

"_That's right,"_ she replied sarcastically. "_Just because you're favorites with the chief doesn't mean I give a rat's ass, okay? So suck it up and do the paperwork and when I get something that no one else wants, it's yours."_

I hadn't been completely sure how to take her, so I just agreed and yes ma'amed and waited to be dismissed.

But she wasn't done with us.

"_It's nothing personal,"_ she continued. _"I'm trying to help you."_

"_It's fine, ma'am,"_ I assured her, and then I chucked Eames with my elbow to get him to verbally agree.

"_We understand_," he said after a moment.

"_Good, Detective. And maybe tomorrow morning before you show up for work, you'll spend some quality time with a razor. Didn't you learn anything from Detective Lupo?"_

"_Yes, ma'am. I'm sorry…I was running late."_

"_His wife's morning sickness has been really bad_," I explained for my partner.

"_She's expecting? Congratulations_."

"_Twins_," he said, smiling fully, just like he did every time the subject came up.

"_Well, start getting used to less sleep then. And keep a razor in your locker for the mornings that get hectic. My detectives should look professional at all times. What happened to the bun, Hayes?"_

"_I…um…is there a hairstyle requirement?"_

"_Her new boyfriend likes it down,_" Eames had said, and even though I wasn't looking at him, I just knew he was smirking.

Although I had to give him points for not mentioning Bernard by name.

Maybe he'd learned how to keep a secret after all.

"_Is that right?"_ she questioned, narrowing her eyebrows at me. "_Well, so do I, but let's not get carried away, okay? I already went through one detective who thought she was a beauty queen…"_

"_Oh, I'm not…I don't think…"_

"_She doesn't act like that at all,"_ Eames spoke up. _"No worries there, Loo."_

"_Okay then,_" she said, nodding slowly and inspecting both of us. "_It seems like your time away was good on a couple of levels."_

"_Yes, ma'am." _

"_Howard and Green are weeks behind on their 913's. Go see what you can do to bring them up to date."_

She'd finally dismissed us and Eames had groaned all the way back to our desks.

"_913's? I bet Lupo and Bernard are already in the middle of something grisly."_

"_Yeah,_" I agreed. "_But let's do this right and maybe next year at this time, we'll be working over there, too._"

So for two days, we helped dig Howard and Green out of their hole. I wasn't sure what kind of case it would have to be before no one else in the precinct would want it, but whatever it was, it hadn't come in yet.

But Loo had lightened up slightly.

I think she'd just wanted to reestablish her authority, and make sure that Eames and I were working well together.

And we were.

I felt like I'd been partnered with him for years, and he was definitely better than any I'd had so far. I hoped to be able to work with him for a long time.

The door to the pub opened, and I watched Bernard as he glanced briefly around the room before settling his gaze on mine.

I got up from the stool as he approached the table and then I pulled him into a hug.

"My day just suddenly got better," he said as he held me tightly against him.

"Now see? That's what you say to a woman," I commented as he relaxed his hold on me and then we each sat down at the table.

He raised his eyebrow at me, and so I told him about the guy at the bar.

"He was hitting on you? You've only been here…what? Five or ten minutes?"

"Yeah, but he's…inconsequential," I said indifferently. I picked up his hand and held it in mine and said, "Tell me about your day. How's the case going?"

He'd mentioned that his case was overlapping with something that Mary was working on, which told me that details would be few and far between, but he could still give me the basics, which he did.

"So far, everyone's safe, but we haven't found the killer and we haven't figured out who else might be in danger. I have a feeling things are going to get worse before they get better. What about you?"

"Still no case," I told him. "But I heard from Connie tonight."

I filled him in on my conversation with her, and finished by saying, "So maybe we won't go this weekend. I want to wait until he commits one way or the other."

"A trial," he said carefully. "That'll be tough. Are you sure?"

"As opposed to giving him what he wants? Yeah, I'm sure."

He brought my hand up to his lips and lingeringly kissed the back of it. It was a sensual and tender move that filled me with emotion, and I couldn't seem to tear my eyes away from his, even as the waiter came and set our plates in front of us.

"Can I get you guys anything else?" he asked pleasantly.

"We're good," Bernard told him, still holding my gaze. He waited for the waiter to leave, and then he said, "You know, tomorrow it'll be a month since we met. I'm not usually the sentimental type, but I'm thinking maybe we should go out someplace nice."

"Are you trying to get me to wear something other than workout clothes?" I teased.

But I liked his idea.

And I loved that he remembered the day we met.

How crazy was I to have tried to push him away?

"You look beautiful no matter what you wear," he replied. "But we haven't done much along the lines of a real date, so…"

"I think it's a great idea. Maybe I'll even wear a dress."

"Now that just might push me over the edge," he said with a smile. "Although you know, the shorts aren't much better."

"I warned you that I looked bad."

"Not bad. Good. Very, very good."

I didn't have any interest in eating dinner. Not with the way he was looking at me.

I'd rather just box everything up and take it home and eat it later, _afterwards_.

But before I could toss my idea out there, my phone rang.

"Guess what, partner?" Eames said excitedly when I answered.

"We got a case?"

"Uh huh. Saddle up, Hayes. I'll be at your place in twenty."

"I'm not at my place," I said as I looked apologetically at Bernard.

It looked like I'd be eating my dinner out of a box after all, only while in the car heading for a crime scene instead of naked in the bed.

Bernard signaled to the waiter for the check as Eames was saying, "Where are you? I'll just come there."

"I'm not dressed…"

"Whoa, hey!" he interrupted. "I don't need to know…"

"For _work_," I finished pointedly. "I was out running."

"Oh, I thought you were gonna say something else."

"Yeah, no kidding. Okay, go to my place and I'll meet you there, but you might have to give me a few minutes."

I hung up with him as Bernard was pulling cash from his wallet to cover the bill.

"I'm sorry," I told him.

"For getting a case? You've been waiting for two days."

"I'm sorry because I was ready to blow off the meal so that I could take you home and let you help me out of these shorts."

"How long before Eames gets over there?"

"He said twenty minutes."

"I can get us there in ten," he stated suggestively as he took my hand and we hurried toward the front door. "You'll need three minutes to get dressed. That'll leave us seven minutes."

"Seven minutes in heaven," I joked. "I think I played that game when I was a kid."

He leaned over and whispered directly into my ear, using a low, husky tone that sent a wave of arousal through me.

"Not the way I play it."

TBC...


	75. Chapter 75

**A/N: I was only going to do one today, but just for river57...keep it cool, my dear :)**

* * *

><p><strong>Bobby POV<strong>

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><p>It was nearly seven-thirty by the time we got back to 1PP.<p>

I was mentally exhausted from the drive, especially considering that's usually Alex's forte, but one glance at her told me that her state of mind was even worse than mine.

"Go on up to your dad's office," I told Jeremy as we got on the elevator.

"Yeah, enjoy it while you can," Cierra commented haughtily. "Pretty soon it'll be someone else's office."

"Uh huh," Alex agreed drolly. "Because the commissioner routinely fires employees who help bring in murdering spoiled brats."

Cierra glared at her, but Alex maintained her challenging expression and for a brief moment, I thought there was going to be a brawl in the elevator.

I stepped fractionally closer to my wife and cleared my throat to catch her attention.

"I'll take Cierra in for processing and I'll meet you upstairs," I told her.

"Oh, I think I like the sound of that," Cierra quipped. "I've spent enough time with the bitchy little she-cop."

Fortunately for Cierra, the elevator doors opened up on the fifth floor, and I shoved her out so that I could walk her over to processing.

If she'd stayed another second on that elevator with Alex, we would've had to make a pit stop by the emergency room.

"You don't have to push," she scoffed as I headed for the desk.

"Neither do you."

"I wasn't…oh," she said, finally getting what I meant. Then she pouted and said, "She was being mean to me. You didn't hear her. I think she's jealous of me because I'm so much…you know…younger than her and prettier than her. I mean, you think so, right?"

I stared at her in disbelief for a moment, and then I just ignored her. It was probably best not to engage her in conversation.

Not yet anyway.

I glanced around the room and grabbed the nearest available officer.

"We're booking her on kidnapping," I instructed him. "Can you take care of it and then bring her upstairs into an interrogation room?"

"Sure thing, Goren. Give me about half an hour."

"Sit," I instructed Cierra firmly, pointing at the bench next to us.

"Can you at least take off the cuffs?" she asked me, and right on cue, her eyes filled with tears.

"Sure," I said, working the key into the lock. I undid one of them and then slapped it onto the steel eyelet that was attached to the bench. "There you go."

"That's not what I meant," she retorted as I headed back toward the elevator. "Hey! Goren! Come back!"

I could still hear her shouting at me as the elevator doors closed.

That girl was something else.

I jabbed the button for the eleventh floor and then leaned against the back wall.

I felt bad for Alex.

_Really_ bad, and I was anxious for the chance to talk to her alone.

I hadn't been able to specifically hear what Cierra had been saying during the drive, but I could hear her voice and I knew that she'd talked Alex's ear off, and I could only imagine the things she'd said.

I got off the elevator and headed for the squad room, but I caught a glimpse of Alex as I passed by the break room. She hadn't bothered to turn on the light, so she was standing alone in the darkness, with her back to the door.

"Are you okay?"

She turned around at the sound of my voice and gave me a tired smile as she leaned back against the counter.

"The coffee pot was empty. I'm just waiting for more to brew."

"That's not what I asked."

"You mean did I let Cierra get to me? Are you worried about my fragile ego?"

"There's nothing fragile about you," I corrected.

I moved as close to her as I dared, considering we were at work. I came to a stop in front of her, leaving about a foot of space between us.

She sighed heavily and brought her hand up, pinching the bridge of her nose between her thumb and forefinger.

"I'm not so sure about that, Bobby. She's good. I'll give her that. She smells weakness and she's like a…like a…see, I don't even know. She's got me so turned around, I can't even think straight."

"Hey," I said soothingly, reaching out to touch her lightly on the arm. "She's a con artist. A manipulator. But nothing she says is the truth. She's just really good at twisting words until it gets her what she wants."

"Well, apparently what she wants is for me to feel inferior to her."

"And you don't," I stated firmly.

"I…don't know," she admitted. "I feel like I just endured six hours of psychological torture. I can just imagine how Jeremy felt after going through the same type of thing, only while under the influence."

"But see, you know what she was doing. You know she's full of shit. And now she's on our turf, so now she's going to find out that you _have_ no weaknesses. And none of her crap is going to work on you."

"No weaknesses," she repeated, looking at me dubiously. "I can think of quite a few."

"No," I insisted. "You're smart and beautiful and resourceful and dedicated."

I paused for a moment, looking over my shoulder in the direction of the doorway, but all was quiet, so I stepped closer to her and moved my hand from her forearm up to her cheek.

"And passionate and giving and incredibly sexy," I added, dropping my voice to a whisper.

"Don't stop there," she said as a smile played on her lips.

"You want me to keep going? Because I can, you know. I can go all night."

"Yeah, I know you can go all night," she replied coyly. She leaned into my touch and closed her eyes for a few seconds, and then she said, "You don't have to build me up, Bobby. I'm fine. She just…"

"Pushed your buttons. She tried to do it Friday night, but it worked better for her today because you couldn't get away from her. I'm sorry…I should've sat in the back with her."

"No," she said quickly. "I can just imagine what she would've tried to do to you."

"So…we've probably got another fifteen minutes before they bring her up into interrogation. Are you ready for it?"

"I'm ready," she agreed.

Her gaze shifted to the door and then she grabbed onto my tie, pulling me down closer so that she could kiss me. It was brief and fairly chaste, but it held a lot of promise.

And it showed me that her confidence was back.

I moved a respectable distance away from her and she turned to pour us each a cup of coffee.

"The video surveillance of her and Jeremy in Southside doesn't really prove kidnapping," she said as she handed me a mug. She took a sip of hers and then added, "Like she said, it's arguable that they had a date and Jeremy didn't want to tell his dad. The drugs could've been taken voluntarily. A good lawyer will get her off."

"I know. But if her fingerprints pop from that condom wrapper, then we can place her at the scene of Stanley's murder."

"And she'll say she had sex with him and when she left he was still alive and well."

"But then he died within the hour, of the same concoction that killed Kenny Cossman."

"Who wrote a suicide note," she pointed out. "Face it Bobby, if we don't get her to confess, she may very well walk. It's all circumstantial."

"Any word yet from BPD about that data stick?"

"No," she said, furrowing her brow as she set down her coffee and pulled out her phone. "They had to have looked at it by now."

"Maybe there wasn't anything on it," I suggested, although I hoped to hell I was wrong.

"Jeremy said the stick was next to her keys. She must have brought it back with her."

"But what if I'm wrong about the whole thing? The red flashing light doesn't have to be a record light. And even if it is, maybe it's an old-school recorder, and the incident is preserved on a Hi-8 or a VHS."

"She doesn't exactly seem the old-school type to me," she replied as she held the phone to her ear.

"That's true," I agreed. "But I can't believe that…"

I stopped talking when she held up a finger to me and said, "Yes, Detective Rainey, please. This is Detective Goren with the NYPD. Yes, I'll hold."

"I can't believe they wouldn't have looked at it by now," I finished.

"I don't think the BPD is in any hurry to do anything with this case," she pointed out. "They acted like we were wasting their time."

"You'd think they'd want to catch a murdering sociopath who killed two college kids," I said, shaking my head. "I just can't understand that mentality. A suicide note on his computer, confessing to a crime without expressing any remorse? If he wasn't remorseful then why would he kill himself? That whole thing doesn't make sense at all."

"Maybe we can get Cierra to explain it to us," she said with a wry grin.

After another minute, Detective Rainey came on the line, and I could tell that Alex didn't like what he had to say.

"Well maybe we need to come back down there and finish doing your job for you, because the way I see it, you've only half-assed it so far…you _do_ understand the possible implications, don't you? It could mean the difference between prison time and a walk…yeah, that'd be great. You do that."

She hung up and looked at me in annoyance.

"It's in their evidence lock-up."

"So what was on it?"

"He doesn't know. No one looked at it."

"They bagged and tagged a data stick and never looked at it?"

"As far as they're concerned, they have no open crime in which to associate the information, so it's in limbo in their lock-up until it can be assigned a corresponding case number."

"Maybe if they looked at it they'd figure out which case number to give it," I said in disbelief. "Do you think they're just pissed at us?"

"I don't know," she admitted. "But whatever they were, they're definitely pissed now."

"But he's pissed and looking at the stick, right?"

"He said he'd go get it in a few minutes and take a look at what's on it," she said with a nod. "He'll call back within the hour."

"So where are we?" Ross asked as he strode into the break room. "And why is it so dark in here?"

I was just glad that he hadn't come in a few minutes earlier when Alex was kissing me.

Not that he didn't know we engaged in such activities, but he _didn't_ know we did it at 1PP, and since it was a rare occasion for us, I didn't want him to catch us and think otherwise.

"Headache," Alex answered, explaining why she hadn't turned on the lights.

I reached into my pocket and pulled out the dose of ibuprofen that I'd started carrying after she injured her shoulder.

"I hear that," Jeremy said as he came in behind his dad. "Mine feels like it's about to split open."

Alex had started to reach for the ibuprofen, but then she nodded towards Jeremy, indicating that I should offer it to him instead.

"No thanks," he said. "I took some already."

I moved my hand back to Alex and she plucked the pills from my palm and looked at me gratefully as she put them in her mouth and chased them with a swallow of coffee.

"You should go home," Ross suggested to Jeremy.

"No way. I'm not going to miss this. You guys are going to take her down, right? I mean, this is it."

"I hope so," Alex said. "But our evidence is light so we're going to have to get her to admit to something, and she's not exactly the most easily intimidated suspect we've ever dealt with."

"She's a nineteen year old princess whose experience with legal matters is strictly from textbooks," Ross replied. "She's no match for the two of you."

The uniformed officer from downstairs who processed Cierra stuck his head through the doorway and said, "Hey, Goren. I got your girl in interrogation four."

"Thanks," I answered, and then I looked at Alex. "Well, let's go see if the unidentified print from the condom wrapper gets a hit now that she's in the system."

"We'll head over into the observation room," Ross said.

"You know, it's not a stretch to think that she'll pop for something else, too. We could solve dozens of crimes just from bringing her in," Alex quipped as we went into the squad room.

"Don't hold your breath."

"Hey, a girl can dream, can't she?"

My phone buzzed as Alex sat in her chair and pulled up the needed information.

"It's Logan," I told her.

She paused her typing and looked up at me expectantly. We hadn't heard from either him or Carolyn since their meeting with Jack.

_**Can you hear that? It's the sound of Jack, singing the blues all the way to prison.**_

I read the text aloud and then broke into a grin.

"One very bad guy down, one very bad girl to go," I said.

Alex returned my smile, and I could just feel the energy in the room change.

We were going to get her.

"Looks like they're putting on the pressure. We can't let the Logans one-up us," she replied playfully as she turned back to the monitor.

"Definitely not," I agreed as I typed in my response.

_**Give us a few hours and it'll be a duet.**_

**TBC...**


	76. Chapter 76

**Liz POV**

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><p><em><strong>Come on over - bring the popcorn.<strong>_

That was the text Danny sent me twenty minutes ago.

I knew that Jeremy was back and despite having a lump and a laceration on the back of his head, he was none the worse for wear.

And now it was apparently show time.

Time for Alex and Bobby to trip up Cierra and get her to confess.

Danny was right.

A show like this warranted popcorn.

I still had work to do in the morgue, but honestly, I always have work to do, so I wasn't going to feel bad about leaving, considering it was after eight o'clock. My day had started at four a.m., more than sixteen hours ago, and I'd outlasted three other ME's and five assistants.

"What'd I miss?" I asked quietly as I slipped into the observation room.

"You've got good timing," Danny said, handing me a large cup of coffee. "They just went in, and so far, no one's saying anything."

I glanced down at the unrequested caffeine boost and felt a rush of love for my considerate husband.

Even with everything going on at work and at home, it hadn't escaped his notice that I'd be tired tonight.

"Thanks for the coffee," I said, and then I surprised him by giving him a kiss on the cheek, but I brushed off his inquiring look and instead turned to Jeremy. "How's the head?"

"About to implode, I think," he answered. "But I'll survive."

"Yeah, I know another guy with a head like a rock," I mumbled as I looked over the patch-up job that the paramedic had done to the back of his head. "It must be genetic."

Jeremy raised an eyebrow at me, and I smiled and said, "Your dad got clocked by a tray-wielding stripper a few months back, and he barely needed an aspirin."

"She wasn't a stripper," Danny corrected as Jeremy started laughing. "She was a bartender. And she was pretty big."

"Huh," I grunted dubiously.

I started to tease him a little more, but then I heard Bobby's voice through the intercom, and we all shifted our focus to the other room.

"_**Are you waiving your right to an attorney?"**_

"_**Why do I need a lawyer?"**_

"The infamous Cierra," I muttered, laying eyes on her for the first time. "She makes me long for the days of public hangings."

She was definitely pretty, I'd give her that, but hers was a loud and showy kind of pretty.

And it looked like it didn't come without a cost.

I recognized the signs of a recent nose job, and there was no way those boobs were real.

"_**You're being charged with a very serious crime," **_Bobby told her, his tone measured._** "And you're a suspect in several other crimes."**_

_**"You might want to think about getting some assistance from someone with experience in this type of thing," **_Alex added smugly._** "I mean, you're a college kid. What do you know about the law and police procedure?"**_

_**"Probably more than you,"**_ Cierra replied confidently, smiling at Alex in a way that surely made her want to take a swing at her. "_**So let's just do this and get it over with, okay, Miss Detective? And then you guys can pay my way back to Baltimore because I still have finals to study for."**_

"I thought you guys said she was smart," I commented.

"She is," Danny answered.

"Then why the hell is she baiting Alex like that?"

"She hasn't figured out yet that size doesn't matter," Jeremy replied. I snorted out a laugh at his remark and then tuned into the interrogation again.

_**"I don't think you're going to make finals, but you can probably take an online course while you're in Rikers."**_

Cierra smiled sweetly at Alex and said,_** "You talk a good game, but I don't think you have the goods to back it up. I mean, if you did, I'd be in lock-up right now instead of sitting in here with beauty and the beast."**_

Then she moved her gaze to Bobby and looked him over slowly from head to toe before staring at him intently and telling him, _**"And you're the beauty, not her. Although I bet you can be a beast sometimes, too, huh?"**_

"I think it's a good thing I'm here," I stated. "That girl's going to need medical attention."

But as I looked at Alex, I saw that she was calm and collected. I gave her points for letting Cierra's insults roll off of her.

"Did we miss the fireworks?"

I turned around to see Mike and Carolyn coming into the observation room.

Mike had a huge smile on his face, and Carolyn just looked…satiated.

If I didn't know they'd just wrapped up a sting on Jack, I'd think they just finished having sex.

Although I guess putting Jack in prison was probably almost as gratifying.

"Things are just getting warmed up," Danny told them.

"You came to work at this time of night just to watch them?" Jeremy asked.

"Never pass up the opportunity to learn something," Mike said meaningfully. "You wanna be a cop? You won't find any better than those two in there."

Then he glanced at Danny and added, "No offense, boss."

"Hey, I'm with you," Danny agreed amicably.

"_**Tell us about Stanley,"**_ Alex was saying.

"_**Who's Stanley?"**_

"_**He's the guy you were boffing yesterday morning right before you decided to inject him with a lethal dose of ketamine."**_

"_**I was what? Ha! I don't think so. I don't even know this Stanley person."**_

"_**Okay, so you're just in the habit of helping strange men open their condoms, is that it?"**_

"_**Lady, you've lost your mind. Is it menopause? Is that what's making you so bitchy and off your rocker?"**_

"She did _not_ just say that," Carolyn mumbled.

"Why isn't Bobby saying anything?" Jeremy asked.

"He will," Mike said. "He likes to let Alex get things started and then he moves in for the kill."

"So they plan this out ahead of time?"

"They don't need to plan much anymore. It's like a dance," Carolyn explained. "Once you learn each other's rhythm, it just comes naturally."

"_**Yeah, okay, I'm menopausal,"**_ Alex said. "_**That's bad news for you since I carry a gun."**_

"_**You can't threaten me."**_

"_**I'm pretty sure I just did. Now cut the crap and answer my questions."**_

"_**I thought I was in here on some trumped up kidnapping charge."**_

"_**You were. Until your fingerprints matched up to evidence in a murder investigation,"**_ Bobby said quietly from his spot on the far side of the room.

"_**Oh, he speaks,"**_ Cierra mocked.

"_**You're not the least bit concerned?"**_ Alex asked her.

"_**That you guys have evidence against me? No."**_

"_**Then explain your print on the condom packet."**_

"_**You want me to tell you about it? Fine. I fucked him. My stepmother was sleeping with him, and she kept bragging to me how she can get any man she wants, so I had to prove to her that so can I."**_

"This family is screwed up," Danny said.

"_**You knew she was cheating on your father?" **_Alex asked her.

"_**Sure. She's been doing it for years, and I finally got sick of her acting like she's something special. She's not. I mean, damn, she's almost as old as you."**_

I watched Alex as she stared at Cierra, and I could just imagine that she was counting to ten in her head.

Or maybe she was picturing herself choking the life out of the girl, I don't know, but whatever she was doing, it worked.

She didn't take the bait.

"_**So you slept with him and then you went back and told your stepmother about what you'd done."**_

"_**That's right. So hey, maybe she killed him. What do I know?"**_

"_**Interesting that she'd kill him the same way you killed Kenny Cossman."**_

"_**Kenny? Please. He killed himself."**_

"_**Nobody commits suicide with ketamine."**_

"_**Well, he wasn't very bright."**_

"_**No, but you are. Which is how you manipulated him into doing what you wanted. You got him to go to the frat party with you a week ago Friday night, and then he helped you attack Jeremy and Kelly."**_

"_**I don't think that case is your jurisdiction."**_

"_**You're right," **_Alex agreed easily._** "Let's go back to Stanley."**_

"_**Let's not. It was sex, okay? And it wasn't even all that great."**_

"_**What happened afterwards?"**_

"_**Are you taking notes for personal use?"**_

"_**I just want to see whether or not you're going to lie."**_

"_**She'll lie,"**_ Bobby stated. "_**That's all she knows how to do."**_

"_**I don't lie."**_

"_**Sure you do, Cierra,"**_ Bobby said, moving closer to the table in a slow, deliberate manner. "_**You've been lying since we met you. You hate Jeremy, you love him…you and Kelly weren't friends, she confided in you about her boyfriend…you left school on Thursday afternoon, you left late Thursday night…"**_

"_**I never said I left late Thursday night."**_

"_**No, you didn't. But that's what you did."**_

"_**You don't know that. There's no proof."**_

"_**Come on, Cierra,"**_ he said, raising his voice as he braced his hands on the table and leaned in closer to her. "_**Come on, you **_**know**_** we know. You told us you hadn't seen Jeremy in a week, but now you're telling us that the two of you had a date Friday night. A date? Really? Your kind of date sounds pretty dangerous to me."**_

"_**Roofies, cocaine, grain alcohol**_," Alex added. "_**Were you trying to kill him? Or was he so repulsed by you that it took that much to get him to be able to stand being in the same room with you? Come on, Cierra. You think you're this beautiful, desirable woman, but if that was true, why'd you have to give Jeremy Viagra? And even then he wouldn't touch you with a ten foot pole."**_

Alex shook her head and let out a condescending laugh.

"_**Talk about humiliating,"**_ she continued. "_**You know, you can make fun of me all you want to, calling me old or a has-been, but I've never once had a man turn his back on me like that and I've never had to drug one to get him to talk to me."**_

"_**You don't know shit!"**_ Cierra screamed, jumping to her feet.

"_**Sit down!"**_ Bobby fired back as he stabbed at the air with his finger, pointing towards her just-vacated chair.

Cierra glared at him for a full minute, and I found myself almost impressed by her lack of fear, but then I realized that was one of the markers of a sociopath.

It would take more than intimidation to get her.

But she did finally sit back down, and then she looked hatefully at Alex.

"_**He was just playing hard to get,"**_ she stated with annoyance. "_**Kelly had him so whipped that he was afraid to even look at another woman. I mean, come on. She's dead. What's he going to do, sit around pining for her forever? I told him he needed to grow a set and move on."**_

I felt Jeremy stiffen beside me, and I put my hand on his shoulder, squeezing it briefly just to remind him that he wasn't alone.

"_**Let's back up,"**_ Bobby said to her. "_**He was whipped. He wanted nothing to do with you. He was being a big baby about the whole damn thing."**_

"_**That's right."**_

"_**Then why did he go with you?"**_

"_**Why did he…what?"**_

"_**Why did he get in the car with you? You went and picked him up, right? At his father's house."**_

"_**Yeah."**_

"_**Because you said you had a date. But it can't be both ways. Did he agree to go on a date with you? Or was he playing hard to get?"**_

"_**He agreed to the date."**_

"_**Then why did you need the drugs?"**_

"_**Because…he was…he kept talking about Kelly."**_

"_**So you picked him up. He willingly got into the car, and the two of you went…where? Back to your house?"**_

"_**Right."**_

"_**And then what?"**_

"_**We…talked."**_

"_**That's it? When did you start drinking?"**_

"_**I fixed him one as soon as we got there. He said his dad was being a real tool about him drinking and that he hadn't had one all week."**_

"I never said that," Jeremy commented. "I mean, I don't remember being there, but I don't _think_ that so why would I say it?"

"Relax. She's starting to panic, so she's going to say anything and everything to try to get out of this unscathed," Danny told him.

"That's not going to happen," Mike remarked.

"_**So he didn't drink all week and then suddenly he wanted grain laced with roofies."**_

"_**Hey, he's hardcore. What can I say?"**_

"_**Wait, so he's hardcore? Or he's a pussy?"**_ Bobby posed, and Jeremy nearly choked from the description.

"He has to speak her language," I reminded him. "He's not casting aspersions."

"I know, it's just…not something I expected to hear come out of his mouth."

"_**Seems to me like you keep giving us conflicting descriptions,"**_ Alex stated.

"_**Okay, so I fixed him the drink because I wanted him to relax."**_

"_**He didn't ask for it?"**_

"_**No."**_

"_**He didn't even want to be there, did he?"**_

"_**No, he…yes! He wanted to be with me, but he felt bad because of Kelly."**_

"_**So you wanted to help him out by making him practically comatose."**_

"_**I wanted us to have a good time."**_

"_**Even if that's not what he wanted."**_

"_**He's a guy, okay? Guys want me. All guys,"**_ she finished, staring pointedly at Bobby.

"_**Is that why you hit up Stanley on Monday morning?"**_ Alex asked. "_**You were frustrated after Jeremy blew you off, and then my partner ignored your advances…you were striking out right and left over the weekend. It must really suck to be you."**_

"_**I did Stanley because I could, okay? That's all."**_

"_**And you killed him because you could, too. You got away with Kenny's murder, and you couldn't resist taking away something that belonged to your stepmother, too. I mean, she took away your dad, right?"**_

"_**You don't know what you're talking about."**_

_**"What do you call your father's wife?" **_

_**"What do I call her? Um…my stepmother. Or the bitch. Something like that."**_

_**"Do you know what Jeremy calls his?"**_

_**"Are you going somewhere with this? Because I'm really starting to get bored. I think it's about time you two admit defeat and let me go home."**_

_**"He calls her Liz,"**_ Bobby continued, raising his voice to match the escalating tempo of the conversation.

It was almost like being at the symphony, the way those two built the crescendo.

_**"Okay, so?"**_

_**"So that tells me that you're the one who sent the text to his dad Friday night."**_

_**"He was blitzed out of his mind. I was helping him out."**_

_**"And you threatened him by telling him that if he told anyone about Friday night, then something would happen to his stepmother."**_

_**"I never said that."**_

_**"Sure you did. But why bother threatening him? Why not just give Jeremy the ketamine cocktail?"**_ Bobby asked suddenly.

_**"The…what? Why in the world would I give him ketamine and propofol?"**_

"Oh my God, she walked right into that one. How come they never see it coming?" I asked rhetorically.

"Propofol?" Carolyn asked.

"It was mixed with the ketamine in the two murder victims. They've never mentioned it out loud. Only the killer would know it."

_**"Exactly,"**_ Alex said smugly. "_**Why would you give him ketamine **_**and**_** propofol? You only wanted to shag him, not kill him. Although with Stanley, you did both. What about Kenny? Did you sleep with him before you killed him?"**_

I watched the horrified expression cross over Cierra's face as she realized her slip and then Alex got up from the table and pulled her phone from her pocket.

"Who was she waiting on?" Carolyn asked.

"BPD," Danny answered. "They confiscated a data stick. They think she videotaped her session with Jeremy."

_**"Why propofol?"**_ Bobby was asking. _**"Was the ketamine not fast enough for you?"**_

_**"I'm done talking."**_

_**"And how would you know that the ketamine wasn't fast enough?**_" he continued. "_**Was Kenny not your first time?"**_

_**"Did you hear what I said? Lawyer."**_

_**"Yeah, you're gonna need it,"**_ Alex said as she hung up her phone.

_**"It won't take much to get me off,"**_ Cierra remarked. _**"I misspoke, that's all. And you two had to jump on it because you've got some kind of vendetta against me."**_

_**"I'm not talking about the propofol,**_" she replied. "_**I'm talking about the data stick. Your little documentary, so to speak."**_

_**"My…what? You had no right to look at that!"**_

_**"Oh, but we didn't. The Baltimore Police did. And guess what they found?"**_

I don't know about Cierra, but I was on pins and needles waiting to hear.

But Alex took her time with the information, walking over to Bobby and after he leaned down so that she could whisper into his ear, the two of them shared a victorious look.

_**"You just had to record everything, didn't you? So that you could relive it, and get off on the power you exerted over your victims."**_

"She taped herself with me after she drugged me," Jeremy said. "I knew it was possible, but I still can't believe it."

"I think it's more than that," Mike said knowingly.

_**"It's inadmissible**_," Cierra said, but I could tell she wasn't so sure anymore. "_**You two have been out to get me from the beginning, and I don't understand it because I didn't do anything to deserve this."**_

She started crying, but Alex said, "_**We've got three hours' worth of video that says differently. Get on your feet, Cierra."**_

_**"Why?"**_ she wailed. _**"Just let me call my lawyer!"**_

_**"Oh, we will. But we want you to be able to give him the whole story, so let's do it right. The charge of kidnapping is being amended. You're now under arrest for assault, kidnapping, and murder. And you know what? I think we're going to have to fight for you."**_

_**"What do you mean?"**_

_**"Because Baltimore wants you for rape and two counts of murder. And since they have the death penalty, this will be one fight I won't mind losing."**_

I watched as Bobby handed the girl off to an officer waiting just outside the door and then a moment later, he and Alex came into the observation room.

"I didn't know we had such a big audience," Alex commented, but she had a smile on her face.

"We all wanted to see the pros in action," Carolyn told her.

"Very impressive," Mike said. "So she really recorded everything?"

"The frat party, Kenny, her session with Jeremy, and then Stanley, too."

"So that's…evidence now? They're going to show it in court?" Jeremy asked.

"We'll see," Danny answered. "It may not come to that. Once she gets her lawyer, Bobby and Alex will sit down with them again, along with an ADA, and they might be able to work something out."

"This is a good thing, Jeremy," I told him. "It means it's over. There's irrefutable proof that she was responsible for everything."

He looked slightly shell-shocked, but then he finally broke into a grin.

"So it's really over."

"What happens next is all up to you, but yeah…now you can put this behind you."

"I don't know about you guys, but Steve-O's is calling my name," Mike said. "I haven't eaten since…I don't know when, and I'm sure as hell going to drink a beer to Jack Quarles being behind bars."

"And Cierra Bingham," Alex added. "I can't think of two more demented people deserving of prison."

"I'm in," Bobby agreed with a nod.

"How's the head, Jeremy?" Danny asked.

"Better. Everything's better now. And I'm starving, so let's go."

**TBC...**


	77. Chapter 77

**Alex POV**

* * *

><p>Friday morning, I woke to the feel of Bobby's lips on the side of my neck.<p>

The room was still dark, with just a hint of the sun's early morning rays trying to squeeze through the blinds.

Our legs were tangled together beneath the sheets and his fingers traced random patterns over my bare skin.

Not a bad way to wake up.

Ever since our dealings with Cierra on Tuesday night, Bobby had been more attentive, more complimentary of me than ever.

And that's saying something.

But I think he was afraid that her insults had cracked my self-confidence.

The menopause thing, the disparaging remarks about my looks…and he'd only heard about a tiny portion of what she'd said to me during our interminable drive back to New York.

I had to give her credit for having excellent aim with the psychological arrows.

And while I can't say that her words didn't bother me, I did manage to hide my emotions while we got the job done.

And we _definitely_ got the job done.

It was in the hands of the two jurisdictions' DA's now, but wherever she ended up spending her time, it was going to be considerable.

As I'd happily said to her before walking away from our last meeting, she'd be older than me before she even got the chance to get out of prison.

Tuesday night, after our interrogation victory and after our celebratory dinner and drinks at Steve-O's, Bobby and I had come back home where he'd proceeded to worship every inch of me.

And let me tell you.

The man is thorough.

And vocal.

He made a point of cataloguing and complimenting every part of me.

Ross had given us Wednesday off, since we'd been putting in so much overtime lately, and so we spent the entire day in bed.

It was relaxing and rejuvenating and incredibly sensual, and it finally hit me that Cierra didn't know what the hell she was talking about.

I'm an attractive woman, in my own way.

I _must_ be because Bobby was the catch of the century and since I managed to make him happy and satisfy him sexually, then there had to be something okay about me.

I said those words out loud to Carolyn on Thursday, when we went back to work, and she looked at me like I was out of my mind.

"_Okay? Are you kidding me?"_

"_You know what I'm saying."_

"_No, I don't. Is this because of that Cierra girl?"_

"_What? No! I'm just…I don't know. Scrutinizing. Analyzing."_

"_Underselling," _she'd said. "_You're beautiful and you're an amazing person. That's why Bobby loves you. Hell, if I was into women, I'd be fighting him to win you over. And let me tell you – I'd give him a run for his money."_

I'd laughed at her doggedness on the issue, but she raised an eyebrow at me and said, "_I'm serious. I don't want to hear any more of that _okay_ crap, you got me?"_

"_Wow, is this you being a badass?"_

"_It was my turn," _she said with a grin. _"I think you had to pull it on me last week." _

The rest of Thursday went remarkably well.

We hadn't caught another case yet, but we were still tying up the loose ends with Cierra's case, so it worked out well that we had time to spend at 1PP.

I checked in with Sean just before we clocked out.

"_How's the new case coming?"_ I asked him.

"_How'd you know we caught a case?"_

"_Because I know everything,"_ I joked. "_And because Bernard might have mentioned that Lauren was working on something."_

"_I don't think like my partner dating a guy in your department."_

"_Okay, well, why don't you tell her that? No, wait…don't tell her until I'm around. I'd really love to see her kick your ass."_

He snorted out a laugh, and I said, "_Hey, at least she's not divulging secrets about you."  
><em>

"_Yeah, yeah, okay. I deserved that. The case is moving slow," _he admitted_. "And it doesn't help that we're catching a lot of flak about it. And by we, I mean me."_

"_From who?"_

"_Oh, you know…other detectives in the house. They want to know if I need my big sister to help me solve my case, that kind of thing."_

"_I hope you're not letting it bother you."_

"_It's a little frustrating," _he said._ "Especially since I'm wondering if maybe they're right."_

"_They're not, and you know it. So quit bitching about it and solve the damn thing."_

"_Yes ma'am," _he laughed.

"_So did you take care of that thing for Lupo?"_

"_That's why you're calling, isn't it? You didn't trust me to get it done."_

"_I trust you. Otherwise I would've done it myself."_

"_It's done."_

"_Good. How's Alicia?"_

"_Sick as a dog, and I don't know what genius labeled it morning sickness, because it lasts all day."_

I'd chatted with him for a few more minutes and then I heard Hayes call out his name excitedly, and I knew the tone.

She'd gotten a lead.

"_Go catch your killer,"_ I told him, but I'm not even sure if he heard me because he was already shouting out his goodbye and slamming down the phone.

Bobby and I left 1PP shortly thereafter.

Dinner was Chinese take-out, just me and him. It was a nice quiet evening at home, which would be a good contrast to tonight's party.

Mary's housewarming.

I had a feeling it was going to be quite the shindig.

Ross had promised to hold off on case assignments as best as he could. He had a few pairs of detectives who had open slates that wouldn't be coming to the party, so they were first in line for new cases.

And maybe that sounds like he was playing favorites, but considering the number of cases we'd tackled in the past week, I didn't feel bad about it at all.

The tough one was going to be getting Lupo and Bernard there.

Well, and Mary, of course.

And we needed all three of them there, but I knew they were knee-deep in a murder investigation.

The good news was that no new bodies had turned up, so it was justifiable for them to have a night off as long as no new developments cropped up in the late afternoon hours.

It would have to be a wait-and-see kind of thing.

And if we had to wait…well, then we'd just have to wait. Sometimes circumstances were unavoidable.

Mulder had gone home from the hospital on Wednesday, and Connie mentioned that he was doing really well. She kept in touch with him via text and she'd said that as soon as he was healthy again, he was going to talk to Carolyn about getting him an interview with the FBI.

I was glad to know that his brush with death hadn't changed his interest in law enforcement. I had a feeling that the Bureau would be thrilled to get their hands on him.

And speaking of hands…

Bobby's got the best hands…ever.

His fingers continued to trail over my skin, in a soothing yet tantalizing manner that took me from half-awake to fully aroused in a frighteningly small amount of time.

"It's not natural, you know."

"What's that?" he hummed as he continued to nuzzle in the vicinity of my ear while he simultaneously pressed the hard length of him against my back side.

"Your amazingly insatiable sex drive," I said, enjoying the feel of him for a moment before turning onto my back so that I could see his face.

I love the way he looks first thing in the morning, so rumpled and youthful and sweetly sexy.

"We just did this last night," I reminded him.

"I can't get enough of you," he said huskily as his mouth moved from my ears, across my cheek until he started teasing my lips with his own. Light, barely-there kisses that had me restless with anticipation. "But if you're not in the mood…"

"I didn't say that," I said, turning into him so that I could press my body against his. "I can't imagine myself ever saying that."

He smiled and grabbed onto my hips, and then rolled us over so that I was on top of him.

"Are you sure?"

"What do you think?" I responded as I settled down on him, taking him in completely before leaning down to kiss him.

"I think that life doesn't get any better than this."

After that, we didn't talk for awhile.

Or at least, not using words.

The experience was amazingly tender and made me feel so beautiful, so loved.

It also made me wish that we had the day off again today so that we could spend it in bed, like we did on Wednesday, but no such luck.

And when I finally came down from my post-coital high, I looked at the clock and realized that if we didn't get moving – quickly – we were going to be late.

"I don't want to say it, but…"

"I know. We need to get up."

But he still spent another minute with his arms around me before reluctantly letting me go.

"I don't know how people do it," he said as he climbed out of bed.

"Do what?"

"Leave the house in the morning, and not see their spouse all day long. I just can't imagine going eight or ten hours without seeing you."

"Maybe it keeps them from getting tired of each other," I posed.

"Then they're not married to the right person," he stated.

We managed to make it to work on time. Mike and Carolyn were already at their desks, each working on stacks of paperwork.

"I don't know about you guys, but I did _not_ come back to MCS to sit behind a desk."

"Would you rather Ross gave us the next floater that pops up and we spend our Friday night in the morgue?" Carolyn asked him.

"Well, no," he admitted.

"Then shut up," she said with a smile.

"Ah…marital bliss," he joked. "Where's Lupo? He needs to see this."

"Trying to save him from joining the ranks?" Bobby said as he sat down at his desk. I rolled my eyes at him as I sat down across from him.

"Save him?" I questioned.

"Not save him _per se_," he said as he flashed me a smile.

"How else could you possibly mean that?"

"Don't answer that one, Bobby," Mike said. "You'll only dig a deeper hole."

"Sage advice," I said, enjoying the bantering.

It hadn't always been this fun at Major Case, but it certainly had been since we'd come back.

The rest of the day went pretty much the same. A lot of paperwork combined with intermittent teasing, pranks, and lame jokes.

"Hey, Bobby," Mike called out. "What's the difference between a bachelor and a married man?"

Bobby raised an eyebrow at him, and so Mike continued, "Bachelor comes home, sees what's in the refrigerator, goes to bed. Married man comes home, sees what's in the bed, and goes to the refrigerator."

"Keep it up, Mike," Carolyn said, although she was laughing as she said it. "You won't have anything in the fridge or the bed."

And of course, he did keep it up, mostly because he can't help himself, but I could tell that Carolyn was happy to see him in such a good mood.

And I didn't blame him at all.

Carolyn had gotten a call from her friend at the Bureau, who told her that Jack's probation from his previous crimes had been officially revoked, and that sentence, combined with the punishment involved in his embezzlement and additional counterfeiting charges, was going to put him in federal prison for the rest of his life.

Maybe there is justice in the world after all.

"Okay, we are _done_," Bernard announced when he walked into the squad room at four-thirty. "No one else is allowed to get killed tonight."

Lupo was behind him, looking exhausted and slightly ill.

"Are you okay?" I asked him.

"He's fine," Bernard answered, tossing a couple of files onto his desk. "Right, Lupes?"

"Yeah. Fine," he said distractedly.

"And we're at a good stopping point, so we're checking out," Bernard said. "We'll see you guys at Mary's party, right?"

"Seven o'clock," I said with a nod.

The party had actually been moved to the Millennium.

It was strange to have a housewarming party somewhere other than at the new abode, but Mary said she'd gotten carried away with the invitations, and there was no way she'd have room in her apartment.

But this worked out better anyway.

The two of them left almost as quickly as they'd arrived.

"I'm with them," Mike said, sitting back in his chair and throwing his pen onto his desk. "It's Friday night. It's been a hell of a week. Let's blow this pop stand."

**TBC...**


	78. Chapter 78

**Connie POV**

* * *

><p>"Are you sure about this whole marriage thing?"<p>

"You mean, the institution in general, or Lupo specifically?"

I was trying not to be offended by Mike's question because he and I had been getting along really well lately, and so surely he didn't mean anything bad by it, but after the whole Carl fiasco, I wasn't in the mood to defend my position.

"Relax," he said, obviously picking up on my annoyance. "I'm just trying to be your friend here."

"You think I haven't thought it through?"

"I'm sure you have."

"So it's Lupo, then" I said as I sat back in my chair. "You know, if you try to tell me he's not good enough…"

"Connie," he interrupted. "I'm just asking the question. And maybe I didn't phrase it right, so let me start again. Are you sure that you'll be ready by August? It's not that far away."

I let out a heavy sigh and calmed my frazzled nerves.

Mike was my friend. I know that, and I also know that he and Lupo were no longer adversaries, so he wasn't questioning my judgment.

He was just trying to look out for me.

We were sitting in his office, working through opening statements for a trial that was going to start on Monday.

It was nearly quitting time, and I still hadn't heard from Lupo. That bothered me a little. He'd been pretty busy this week, but it wasn't just that.

I mean, he's been busy with cases before, but this was different. Something was off with him and I couldn't put my finger on it.

Maybe it was the specific case he was working on.

I knew it involved kids, and he usually struggled with cases like that, but I guess what surprised me was his unwillingness to talk about it.

I mean, we talked, but I still felt like I wasn't getting the whole story.

Although, I also knew that he was working with Mary, so maybe it was just that he _couldn't_ tell me the whole story.

But then there was the not-sleeping thing, too.

For the last two nights, he's been restless. Not like he was when Carl was on the loose, but still…it was painfully obvious that something was on his mind.

I decided that after the party tonight, I was going to get him to come clean about whatever was bothering him. If it was something confidential with the case, then…well, I'd think of something.

But if he kept up the way he was going, he was going to get an ulcer.

"I'm sorry," I told Mike. "I guess I'm a little defensive about it. You know, the way Carl went on and on about it, and really, not just him. I feel like every time I turn around, someone's saying _oh, you're dating him?_ Like it's just this impossible-to-fathom occurrence and I'm so sick of it."

"I can see that," he said with a smile.

"But in answer to your question…yeah, I'm ready. I'm ready _now_. I tried to get Lupo to elope, but he wouldn't do it because he insisted that we should have our friends around us, and my brother…he wants all of that for me, but I told him I don't care about any of it, you know? I just want to be married to him."

"I had you pegged for the whole fancy white dress, big church, ten-foot-long train kind of girl. You really told him you wanted to elope?"

I shrugged and nodded my head.

"The commitment is the part that's important."

He stared at me for a moment, but didn't say anything, so I changed the subject.

"So how was your date the other night?"

"Oh, it was…good."

"What does she do? Or better yet, what's her name? You haven't told me anything at all."

"She works for the government."

"Oh, okay, well that tells me everything I need to know," I replied wryly.

"You don't need to know anything," he fired back teasingly.

"We'll see about that. Are you bringing her to the party tonight?"

"That's the plan," he said, and then he glanced down at his watch. His action caused me to look at mine, too.

It was almost five, and still nothing from Lupo.

"Looks like I might be going stag tonight," I commented. "Good. It'll give me plenty of time to pump your date for information."

Before he could respond, someone knocked on the door and I looked up to find Lauren standing outside of the office.

I waved her in and was surprised to see her in a dress.

A really nice dress that looked absolutely gorgeous on her.

"Wow…Lauren…are you blowing off the housewarming party to go on a date at some swanky place?"

"No," she laughed. "But since it's at the Millennium and B. and I didn't get to go on our official date the other night, we figured we'd combine the two."

"Oh," I said, looking down at my own rather plain looking navy blue skirt.

"So what brings you here, Detective?" Mike asked her.

"I came to pick up Connie," she said, looking at me as if I was supposed to know that.

"You did?"

"Didn't Lupo send you a text?"

"Um…no," I said as I pulled out my phone. "Or at least, I didn't get it."

"Oh, yeah, um…B. said that they're still working, and that they were just going to meet us there, so I offered to come by and get you so that we could go together."

"Okay," I agreed, still wondering why I hadn't heard from Lupo, and then as I got up from the chair, my phone buzzed.

_**Running late. Meet you there. Lauren's going to come pick you up.**_

"Lupo?" Lauren asked me.

"Uh huh. I really need to get him a new cell phone," I commented as I put my phone away. "Mike, are we done?"

"Yeah, sure, get out of here. I'll see you later tonight."

So I followed Lauren out of the office and went back to my desk to get my purse.

It struck me again, how stunning she looked, and I could just picture the look on Bernard's face when he saw her.

"You look absolutely beautiful, by the way," I told her. "I'm feeling a little underdressed."

"Thank you. And you're not underdressed. But you know, we've got time…if you want to go by your place," she told me.

I thought about it for a minute, already pondering what dress I could change in to.

Lupo and I hadn't had much time together this week, so it might be nice to dress up for him and turn this into a romantic evening for us.

Maybe it would help us to get back on even footing.

"That's a great idea," I agreed. "Let's go."

But somehow, between the DA's office and the apartment, I let her talk me into wearing something from her closet, so we detoured and went to her apartment instead.

"I bought it, but I haven't worn it because I just don't think it works with my coloring, but it'll look great on you."

I didn't point out that our coloring was fairly similar because she seemed too excited about the prospect of me wearing her dress.

It was odd seeing her act so…overtly feminine. I wouldn't have expected it from her, and maybe that wasn't fair of me to think that just because she's a cop, she must not like girlie-type things. In fact, it's _definitely_ not fair of me, so I decided that I'd better keep an open mind.

And I have to admit that she has a good eye.

Her dress was beautiful and it fit me perfectly.

"So is that Bernard's suit hanging on the back of the door?" I asked coyly as I looked at myself in her full-length bedroom mirror.

"He keeps a spare here just in case," she replied with a grin.

"Just in case he doesn't make it home?"

"Something like that."

"And how many nights did he make it home this week?" I teased.

"More than I would've liked," she admitted. "Tuesday night, I got called out, and then the next two nights, he worked pretty late."

"Yeah, tell me about it. I haven't seen much of Lupo since Tuesday night, either."

"So have you heard back from Schmenke?" she asked as we left the bedroom and headed for the door.

It was after six, so it was time to head for the Millennium. She turned out the lights and patted her cat on the head and then we left the apartment.

"He hasn't called back. He's playing chicken with me."

"He thinks I'll cave to avoid a trial," she stated knowingly.

"Yes."

"I'm not. Bring it on," she said firmly. "It'll be you, though, right? You'll prosecute it?"

"I'm sure Jack will agree to let me run with it," I answered. "But you know how it'll go."

"I know. Schmenke will dig into my past and try to find anything he can to make me look bad. That's fine. I'm ready."

She was quiet as she drove us back into Manhattan, and I left her alone with her thoughts.

I ran my hands over the smooth fabric that covered my legs and I thought again about Lupo.

Was he having doubts about us?

Is that why he's been distant lately?

We rarely went a day or two without having sex, and yet this was day three.

It had been since Tuesday night, after we made out in Mike's office.

Was it really only because of his late hours and his gruesome case?

Or was he having second thoughts?

I felt slightly nauseous at the prospect, but I couldn't let it go.

Maybe that was why he didn't want to elope.

Maybe it didn't have anything to do with anything except the fact that he wasn't sure about me.

Lauren parked the car in the garage, and together we got out and went into the posh hotel.

John lives in the penthouse suite, so I headed for the elevator, but Lauren stopped me.

"Hang on," she said. "I've never been in this place before. Let's check it out."

She didn't wait for my response, but instead crossed through the lobby and started wandering down a hall.

_Detectives_, I thought with an internal chuckle. _Always so inquisitive_.

She was several feet in front of me when she reached to open a ballroom door, and I started to call out to her, to warn her that there might be a party going on in there when I heard another door open behind me.

I turned around and there was Lupo.

I hadn't expected to see him yet, since he'd said he would be running late, and I absolutely wasn't expecting to see him looking like he did.

Black suit, crisp white shirt, silk tie…he was clean-shaven, which was never the case with him at this time of day, and his hair was mostly tamed, with the exception of a rogue piece that didn't want to lay down.

He looked perfect.

_God, please don't let him be having second thoughts. _

I couldn't take my eyes off of him as he slowly approached me. As he got closer, I realized that he looked nervous, and that made me even _more_ anxious.

"You have got to be the most beautiful woman in the world," he said when he was finally standing in front of me.

"I was thinking the same thing about you. Well, not the woman part, but…"

I smiled uneasily, but he didn't smile back.

Instead, he picked up my hand and brought it to his lips and then he said, "Are you sure that you still want to marry me?"

"Am I…sure?" I managed to say, his question so close to my own that it threw me off guard. "Yes, of course I am. I've been wondering about you. I mean, this week has been…weird and disconnected and…"

"Connie," he interrupted. "Let's get married."

"I'm so glad you still want to," I said, breathing out a sigh of relief. "I had myself convinced that you'd changed your mind, and…"

"I mean now. Tonight. Let's get married."

**TBC...**


	79. Chapter 79

**Lupo POV**

* * *

><p>I didn't breathe once during the entire twenty minutes that it took for Connie to respond.<p>

And okay, so it wasn't twenty minutes.

It was probably more like twenty seconds.

Or maybe even only five seconds, I don't know.

But while I stood there, not breathing, I held her hand and stared into her eyes and I decided that this was either going to be the best day of my life, or the worst.

"You want to…do it…_now_?"

"You can say no," I said quickly. "It's not usually the kind of thing you spring on a woman, but you said you wanted to elope and I wanted you to be able to do it in front of our friends, and Ben, and so I kind of thought that maybe this would be a blend of what both of us wanted and…"

I stopped talking when she kissed me.

In fact, I stopped thinking, too.

I blocked out everything but the taste of her and the feel of her cool hand against my cheek.

Her other hand was warm, but that was because I was gripping it so tightly, probably too tightly, as though I was afraid she might escape.

And maybe I was.

But not anymore.

Because once she started kissing me, I relaxed into it and released her hand so that I could wrap my arms around her and pull her against me.

We let it go on for several minutes and then she finally pulled away. She smiled at me and used her thumb to wipe away the remnants of her lipstick from my mouth.

"I just…I can't…" she began and then she dropped her head self-consciously. "I'm sorry. I'm being ineloquent again."

"I'm really just kind of waiting on one word in particular."

"What? Oh! Yes! Oh my God, Lupo, I'm sorry – yes!"

"You really know how to make a guy sweat it out, don't you?" I asked in relief as I swept her into my arms again.

"You thought I'd say no? Are you kidding me? I practically had myself convinced that you were changing your mind about me, and I…"

"Never," I interrupted. "I'm never going to change my mind about you. And I know this week has been strange, but it's only because I was trying to make the arrangements and keep it a secret from you, on top of the case, and…"

"What kind of arrangements?" she asked, as though it suddenly occurred to her that this was more than just a whim on my part.

"That's why Mary moved the party here," I told her. "And I got a court clerk to come in to put the stamp of approval on our license as soon as you sign on the dotted line…and Judge Whitmore is on her way. You know, she married Alex and Bobby, and Mike and Carolyn, so I thought that was a good omen…and Ben…"

"Ben's here?"

"He got here about an hour ago," I confirmed. "You don't think I'd let anyone else give you away, do you? Although, I don't know…he might not let me have you."

"I can't believe you went to so much trouble. And…Lauren knows, too, doesn't she? That's why she talked me into wearing this dress…"

"Everyone knows," I told her. "It wasn't just me who put this together. I had help. And right now, they're all waiting to see if I come in alone and heartbroken, or if you actually agree to go through with it. I think there's a pool going around."

"You better have put your money on me," she said as I took her hand and walked with her to the ballroom doors.

"Every last cent," I promised. "I was going for broke."

The next hour or so was a whirlwind of activity as we made the rounds through the room.

The judge was scheduled to arrive at eight o'clock because the pessimistic side of me had wanted to make sure that I had enough time to cancel without making her waste a trip, just in case Connie turned me down.

Not that I really thought she'd say no.

I mean, yeah, I worried about it.

I couldn't sleep the past two nights, wondering if I'd made a mistake by planning it like this.

I'd literally made myself sick this morning as nerves and every past insecurity came to take residence in my mind.

But all of that was in the past.

We were really going to do this.

_Tonight_.

I could barely wrap my brain around it.

"I don't need to tell you what will happen if you break her heart, do I?" Ben said, coming up behind me as I stood alone watching Connie from across the room.

She was talking with Alex and Carolyn and I couldn't resist just looking at her. She was so beautiful.

I tore my eyes away from her and turned to look at Ben.

"No, you don't," I replied with a smile. "But make sure you threaten her with the same thing, okay?"

"Here," Mike said as he and Bobby joined us. He held out a shot glass to me, and he had one in his other hand, too. Bobby pushed one into Ben's hand and then held his up.

"What are we drinking to?" I asked.

"Nothing. You just looked like you needed a shot," Mike joked. "No, really, we just thought you might want some wedding-night pointers. You know, the ins and outs of how things work."

Ben started laughing, loudly enough to get Bernard's attention and so he wandered in our direction.

"Am I missing out on the pre-wedding toast?" he asked.

"No, just the sex-ed class," Bobby said.

"I think I'm set," I told them.

Ben cleared his throat and said, "No, let them talk. Maybe they'll teach you that the kitchen floor isn't exactly the best place…"

Mike and Bobby looked at each other and they both shrugged.

"There's nothing wrong with the kitchen floor," Bobby said.

"Dining room table," Mike added.

"Really any available hard surface," Bernard said.

"Yeah, I got it covered," I assured them. "Connie and I do just fine."

But they couldn't resist giving me a hard time about it as we drank our shots and then Mike went to bring us another round.

"Two will take the edge off," he told me. "It'll make you forget about what you're getting ready to do."

"I don't want to forget," I said, catching Connie's eye as she walked towards me. "I want to remember every minute."

It was almost eight, and the judge had just come into the room.

This was definitely going to be the best day of my life.

* * *

><p><strong>Mary POV<strong>

I'm not a wedding person.

Despite my recent consideration about my own marital status, that still doesn't mean that I enjoy going to the actual ceremonies.

They're always so…sweet and sappy and emotional and…bleh.

And maybe it's because I'm a realist and I know that more often than not, the couple presently promising each other forever really only means it for the next few years.

Because more than half of all marriages end in divorce.

But this one was different.

When Lupo asked me on Monday if he could hijack my housewarming party and turn it into a wedding, I was more than a little surprised.

"_I thought you guys were getting married in August."_

"_We were. But she wants to do it now."_

"_And you…"_

"_I want to give her whatever she wants,"_ he'd answered simply.

And then he'd mentioned his idea of having it at the Millennium, and how Alex's brother Sean was picking up the wedding bands for him, and he had a judge willing to do the ceremony, and he had an idea about how to get Connie dressed for the occasion…he had the whole thing thoroughly planned out.

"_You've given this a lot of thought."_

"_I haven't thought about anything else since she first mentioned she wanted to elope,_" he admitted. "_But I wasn't sure how to pull it all together."_

"_The Millennium_," I said with a nod. _"Sure. Let's do it."_

"_Really?"_

He'd seemed both excited and nervous at the same time.

"_Did you think I'd say no? No, this'll be great. As long as we can manage to _not_ get stuck at work."_

So we'd worked our asses off all week in an effort to get a handle on the case.

I wasn't usually crazy about working with the locals, or at least I hadn't been back in Albuquerque, but coordinating the investigation with Lupo and Bernard was seamless.

We hadn't wrapped it up yet, but we were definitely making progress, and I didn't see the harm in taking the night off, as long as nothing new cropped up.

"_Give him the whole weekend_," Bernard had told me at lunch today. "_If something comes up, just call me."_

"_And you're going to work it without your partner?"_

"_I'll have you, right? And if I need someone else, Lauren will help. Or the Gorens, or Logans…but he's not working this weekend. They can't take a honeymoon, but the least they can do is spend the weekend at home without any interruptions."_

Although what he didn't know was that I'd already planned on leaving him alone because John's gift to them was a weekend in the honeymoon suite of his hotel.

When I left Lupo and Bernard earlier today, as they were getting ready to go back to 1PP, Lupo looked pale.

"_It's your wedding day,"_ I reminded him. "_Aren't you supposed to be happy?"_

"_Thank you,"_ Bernard said, looking pointedly at his partner.

"_What if she doesn't want to do it? Or what if she gets mad that I was so presumptuous to set this up? I mean, it is presumptuous right? Maybe I shouldn't have done it like this. Maybe I should've talked to her about it. What if I forgot something? Did I forget something?" _

"_I've seen less comprehensive details on a surgical pre-op waiver," _I told him_. "It's going to be perfect."_

And it was.

He'd organized everything down to the last minutiae.

So even though I'd already liked Lupo, his determination to do this for Connie made me like him even more.

And I found myself getting slightly emotional as I watched the two of them exchange vows.

I sat in the chair, which I pulled close to John's so that our legs were pressed together, and I held his hand and thought about what it would be like to be the one saying the vows.

Connie looked so sure of herself.

Was I that sure?

"Ask me now," I said as I leaned close to John so that I could whisper to him.

"Ask you what?"

"You know, that thing you've been waiting to ask me. Ask me now."

"Why?"

"Why? You're going to ask my _why_? I'm saying, ask me now because I'm witnessing the most romantic thing ever and I'm feeling especially sappy and in love and if you ask me now, I'll say yes."

"Then I'm not asking now."

I tilted my head, looking up at him in confusion, but he just smiled at me.

"Because…you don't want me to say yes?" I asked.

He let go of my hand and slipped his arm around my shoulders, hugging me closer to him, and then he spoke into my ear.

"Because I want you to be pissed at me and still say yes. I want you to be annoyed and frustrated and…feeling really, really unromantic and then have you still want to say yes. I want you, Mary. And I want us to be together forever, but I want you to be really sure, not just swept up in a romantic moment. So I can wait."

He finished his statement with a lingering kiss on my cheek and then he sat back in his chair.

I glanced up at Lupo and Connie as they slipped the rings onto each other's fingers, and then I looked back at John.

"You want me to be annoyed with you? Well guess what? I'm pretty annoyed right now. Jeez, I just told you I want to marry you and you have to ruin it by being all...practical and sweet and understanding…"

"That ruined it for you?" he asked with a smile.

"Well, okay, so…no, not really," I admitted.

I have no idea how he could know me so well and yet still like me anyway, but I was so glad he did.

"I love you," he said, once again whispering into my ear. "Get used to that first. And then we'll see what happens."

TBC...


	80. Chapter 80

**Bobby POV**

* * *

><p>I stood and watched as Alex danced with Sean.<p>

The wedding had gone off without a hitch and now the ties were loosening and jackets were getting ditched as the DJ livened up the room with music.

The first dance had just been for Connie and Lupo, of course, but then Alex and I had hit the dance floor for the next several songs until Sean cut in.

"Just one, and then I'm taking Alicia home," he told me. "You don't mind, do you, Bobby?"

I didn't.

It gave me the chance to people-watch for a few minutes.

Lauren and Bernard, who were dancing close even though it wasn't a slow song.

I had a feeling they weren't going to stay at the reception for much longer.

Ross and Liz, who only moments ago informed me that Jeremy was on his way back to New York.

He'd made special arrangements with his professors to adjust his finals schedule, so he'd gone down early yesterday morning. He took two yesterday, and then spent the night in a hotel before finishing the last two today.

He was planning to spend the summer with them before moving in with Aaron while they both went to NYU.

I could just imagine that he was happy to be leaving Baltimore behind.

And then there was Mary and John, who were talking with Cutter and his date. I hadn't been formally introduced to the woman yet, but Mary seemed to know her, although from her expression it was really hard to tell whether she liked her or not.

I just thought it was interesting that the woman looked to be the physical opposite of Connie. She was blonde and short, with tiny, delicate features. It was almost as though Cutter had decided that if he couldn't have Connie, then he didn't want anyone who was even close.

I'd done the same sort of thing myself before I got with Alex. I avoided anyone who might remotely resemble her because…well, I'm not exactly sure why.

Maybe I felt like I'd be doing the woman a disservice because then I'd be comparing her to Alex. Of course, I ended up comparing the tall brunettes to Alex, too.

Not surprisingly, no one ever came close to matching up.

I shifted my gaze to Alex again as she and Sean laughed more than danced, and I thought back to our own wedding.

It was hard to believe that we were about to hit the six-month mark.

It felt like so much longer.

In a good way, I mean.

And maybe it was because I didn't really look at December 12th as the pivotal moment for us.

It was actually the night Alex came to my apartment, after the interview that put Declan away.

I was still astounded by her braveness.

We might have gone on forever, never admitting out loud our love for each other, if she hadn't come over and caught me on the verge of a breakdown.

We'd stood in my kitchen, hugging each other for the first time. I could still remember her words like it was yesterday.

_"You don't have to be alone, Bobby. You always have me. I'll always be here for you. You just have to let me in."_

It was amazing to think how far we'd come.

I'd gone to Minnesota not long after that night, and we'd spent the next week or so teasing each other with suggestive texts and emails.

For the first few days, they were innocent messages. The kind you might send a friend.

And then late on Friday night, when I was in the bed and missing her desperately even though it was silly since she'd never once been in my bed, I sent her a text.

_**What are you up to?**_

Because I was hoping that she wasn't on a date, or at a bar, or anywhere doing anything that didn't involve thinking about me.

_**I just got out of the bath.**_

I'd become instantly hard at the visual her words provided, but she wasn't done.

_**Give me a minute to find something to put on.**_

So she'd _literally_ just gotten out of the bath.

And she was sharing that knowledge with me.

She was teasing me on purpose, and I loved it.

_**Don't do it on my account**_, I'd replied.

And then I'd held my breath, waiting for her response because as soon as I hit _send_ it had occurred to me that maybe I was reading too much into it.

Maybe she just really needed me to give her a minute so that she could pull a full-length flannel nightgown out of her dresser drawer.

And then she texted back.

_**I don't usually sleep naked. Or at least, not when I'm alone.**_

So practical and yet so…leading and enticing.

_**You're not alone. In my mind, I'm there with you, **_I texted.

Her response had prompted my first ever sexting experience.

_**If you're with me, then you need to be naked, too. Are you?**_

And yeah, we could've done it over the phone, but texting was…safer.

It was easier to be bold, although I could still remember how much I'd wanted to hear her voice as I pictured how she might look, lying in her bed that night.

"I'd offer you a penny for your thoughts, but something tells me the rate would be more along the lines of $8.99 a minute."

I tore my gaze away from Alex and looked at Carolyn, who was holding out a drink for me.

"Mike's reminiscing with Van Buren, so I came to see if you wanted to dance, but you look like you're doing just fine as a spectator," she teased.

"Oh, you know. Weddings," I replied vaguely as I accepted the drink. "I was just thinking about when Alex and I first got together."

"I think it's something they pump through the air vents at these things," she agreed with a nod. "You know, to make people who aren't married want to be married, and people who are suddenly remember why they got that way in the first place.

"I don't ever forget that," I countered.

She smiled back at me and said, "Yeah, me neither. This was really nice, huh? I wouldn't have pegged Lupo as the romantic type, but he sure did good with this."

I hummed my agreement as I watched Alex walk towards me, the song having ended.

"Are you making a play for my man?" she joked to Carolyn.

"Yeah, you know, I even spiked his scotch, but nothing works. He's only got eyes for you."

"Good," she said as she took hold of my hand and tipped her head towards the dance floor. "And they're playing our song, so…"

"Go," Carolyn answered with a smile.

"You're not tired of dancing?" I asked Alex as she led the way back to the parquet floor.

"With you? I could dance all night."

"Or…we could go home," I suggested. I pulled her into my arms as we moved easily to the slow rhythm. "And I can get you out of that dress and have my way with you."

She laughed lightly and looked up at me with a coy smile.

"I like the sound of that. Let's finish this song and make the rounds. We can be out of here in ten minutes."

"Are you a little anxious?" I teased, pretending like she was the one about to burst from anticipation.

But it was definitely me.

The walk down memory lane, and the feel of her in my arms…

"When I went to Minnesota," I said suddenly, not waiting for her to respond to my question. "And we were sending each other text messages…"

"You mean the night you caught me as I was getting out of the bath?" she asked knowingly.

"That's the one. So you were really…"

"Naked?" she asked on a laugh. "Yes."

"And you stayed that way while we texted back and forth?"

"Well, yeah. Considering what we were doing, it would've been kind of tough otherwise."

"So you really did it."

"Didn't you?" she questioned, pulling back to look up at me again.

"That night…the next morning…the next night…"

"So this sex drive of yours isn't new," she said playfully.

"I'm telling you. It's you."

She settled firmly against me again as we continued our dance. We didn't talk again until the last strains faded away and then she said, "What made you think about that?"

"The texting? I don't know. I'm just feeling nostalgic, I guess. I remember sitting there, after reading your first text that night, and trying to decide whether or not I was reading too much into it."

"You weren't."

She took my hand and led me from the dance floor and then we proceeded to wander from couple to couple, saying our goodbyes.

"You guys hitting it?" Mike asked me when he caught up to us near the ballroom door.

"Yeah, it's late," I said, even though it really wasn't.

"Uh huh," he said knowingly. "We're going, too. I've got a couple of cigars. Give us a minute and we'll walk with you over to 42nd Street, and we can light 'em up."

So Alex and I slipped out into the hall where we waited for Mike to gather Carolyn.

"It's Friday night," she commented as she stood in front of me, going up on her toes to kiss me. "What are the odds that our phones won't ring?"

"Really good," I told her, and then I kissed her again, taking my time with it before finally pulling back.

"You sound pretty sure of yourself," she commented.

"I am," I answered with a smile. "Because they can't ring if I turn them off."

"We can't do that," she argued lightly, but she looked like she liked my plan. "What if we're needed?"

"You mean by your dad, who's finally realized that we actually _work_ instead of…how did he put it? Make goo-goo eyes at each other?"

"Uh huh. He's been swamped, and I promised we'd help when we could."

"Yeah, well we can't tonight. Maybe tomorrow. Afternoon."

"And Ross?"

"Our on-call shift starts at eight o'clock tomorrow night."

"Bernard? We told him we'd help if he needed us."

"He won't. Face it, Alex. You're stuck with me, with no interruptions, for the next twenty-four hours."

"What are we going to do?" she asked suggestively as she ran her hand down my tie.

"I have a couple of things in mind."

"Only a couple?"

"Well…"

The door behind us opened, and Mike and Carolyn came out into the hall.

"Ready?" Carolyn asked.

"Sure," Alex agreed, although she was slow to take her eyes from mine.

I took her hand and gave it a squeeze and then let go so that I could take the cigar that Mike was offering.

I lit it up as soon as we stepped outside, and then I took a deep pull. For whatever reason, Alex loves it when I smoke cigars. It makes me enjoy them even more, knowing how much it turns her on.

It was like extended foreplay.

"Did you guys see Cutter's date?" Mike asked as we made the leisurely walk to the subway station.

"Yeah, but I didn't really talk to her. Anna, I think?"

"She works for Mary," Carolyn said with a grin. "You should've heard her when she saw the girl walk into the ballroom."

"I take it she doesn't care for her."

"I think she just doesn't like the mixing of worlds," Mike said with a shrug.

"She moved to the wrong city then," Alex said. "Our worlds are mixing all the time. You know, that case Sean and Lauren are working may come to us. I mean, not us specifically, but MCS."

I looked at her in surprise, and she continued.

"Uh huh. They got a lead yesterday on some property owned by one of their suspects, and they found two bodies buried out there. The commissioner said if one more turns up, he's handing the case over to Major Case."

"And yet Sean still wanted to dance with you," Mike mused. "I'm impressed."

"I think he's over the territorial phase," she responded.

"We need to get Ross to bring him and Lauren over to 1PP permanently," Carolyn said.

"I don't think that's too far off," I agreed. "They'll be next, that's for sure."

"Yeah, I'm not sure how much work Bernard would get done if Lauren was sitting next to him," Mike said dubiously. "Did you see the way he was looking at her tonight?"

"Uh huh. About the same way you look at Carolyn," Alex pointed out. "We all know how to work when it's time to work."

"And how to project lustful and lascivious thoughts when it's time for that," Mike replied, waggling his eyebrows at her.

"That's right. So, what am I thinking now?" Alex asked him with a grin.

By this time, we'd come up top at the subway station near Steve-O's, the one between our two houses.

"You're thinking that I don't need to invite you over for a night cap because you and the big guy there have more important things to do."

"You're good," she told him. She kissed him on the cheek while I gave Carolyn a hug goodbye.

"Our phones are going to be off," I told them before we started walking in the opposite direction. "So…Sunday. We'll get together."

"I think that's how we left things a couple of weeks ago, isn't it?" Carolyn asked. "And then everything went to hell."

"Then we're due," I replied. "_Over_due for a nice, quiet weekend."

"Nice quiet weekend," Alex repeated as we headed towards our apartment. "Who are you trying to kid?"

"I don't think that's too much to ask for."

"No, it's not. But I'm not going to hold my breath."

"Definitely not," I said, as I pulled her closer to me. "How can you scream out my name if you're holding your breath?"

"You plan on me screaming? I don't know, Bobby…" she teased.

But she did scream out my name.

And other than the sound of her voice, we _did_ get our quiet weekend.

Until the phone rang on Sunday night.

And _that_ was when everything went to hell.

**The End**

* * *

><p><strong>AN: I almost hate to end these things - thanks so much to everyone who stuck it out with me, and for all of the wonderful reviews. **

**As always, special thanks to Mitzvahgirl for keeping me in line which, as I'm sure she'll tell you, is a pretty difficult task. **


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